


If I Had My Way

by ClockworkCrow (icemink)



Series: The Victory March [1]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, F/M, Inappropriate Use of the Force, Kylo is a prisoner, Leia becomes Rey's friend and mentor, Memories under a blue sun, Oral Sex, Stranded, Survival, Unplanned Pregnancy, trial drama
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-29
Updated: 2019-11-30
Packaged: 2020-09-30 03:27:32
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 22
Words: 64,977
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20439578
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/icemink/pseuds/ClockworkCrow
Summary: Kylo Ren and Rey crash land on an uninhabited planet. Months later they are rescued by the Resistance and Kylo Ren is put on trial. Rey must watch and figure out what it means to have feelings for a man the Galaxy sees as a monster.





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> If I had my way  
If I had my way  
If I had my way  
I'd burn this whole building down
> 
> \- [Samson and Delilah](https://youtu.be/wCYBX1A-ZcM)

“A trial?” Rey asked. “Is that really a good idea?” 

“What else can we do?” Poe said. “You don’t really think we can keep Kylo Ren a prisoner forever? Sooner or later he’s bound to escape, and possibly destroy our base in the process. And as much as I’d like to we can’t just execute him, at least not without a trial.” He shrugged. 

“This is our chance,” Poe continued. “To show the Galaxy both that the Resistance is capable of standing up to the First Order, and that we are better than them. The First Order makes a big deal about standing for law and order, but this our chance to show that we care about justice and the rule of law. You know they would never give any of us trials.”

“We could broadcast it,” Rose said excitedly. “Let the Galaxy see how we do things.”

“Can you do that without the First Order tracking the signal?” Poe asked. “The last thing we need is a rescue attempt.”

“I wouldn’t worry about a rescue,” Finn said. “Hux and Kylo Ren never really got along. I think Hux would be more likely to blow the whole base up, Kylo Ren and all.”

“I can mask it,” Rose assured them. “Although I might need some prep time.”

“I’ll consider it,” Poe said. “But only if you can be sure the First Order won’t be able to find us.”

Rey’s head was spinning at the speed with which everyone seemed to have agreed that they were about to put Kylo Ren on trial.

“Shouldn’t we. . . Shouldn’t we see what the General thinks?” Rey asked desperate to slow things down.

“Of course,” Poe said. “As soon as we get back to base, we’ll run all of it by General Organa. Which is exactly why we need to have a good and solid plan.”

Rey hoped that no matter how good their plan was, General Organa would not approve of her son being put on trial so he could be executed.

But even as she tried to hold onto that hope a voice in her head that sounded a lot like Kylo Ren was saying, “I told you so.”

“I should probably check on him,” Rey said.

“Yeah,” Poe agreed. “The last thing is we need for him to wake up. Might not be a bad idea to give him some sedatives. Just to be safe.”

Rey quickly headed to the medical bay.

He was still unconscious, but the readouts were good. He was going to be fine once he woke up. Really, really angry, but still fine.

She sat beside his bed, and couldn’t help but take his hand.

“Give them a chance,” she whispered. “Show them you can change. You could help us win.”

But she felt foolish even as she said it. After all, he had told her this would happen.

  


* * *

  


**Gavin V, 32 days after the crash**

“You should be hoping it’s the First Order who finds us,” Ben said as he gently traced a circle on her shoulder.

Rey leaned against him as they both watched the fire. 

“Why so they can execute me?” she asked. But there was no animosity in her words. They had been stranded on this uninhabited plant that circled the blue star of Gavin for a while now. First Order, Resistance, they had begun to seem a bit like someone else problems.

“They won’t execute you,” Kylo said, kissing the top of her head. “I won’t let them.”

She snorted in disbelief. “You told the universe I killed Snoke, I don’t think they are going to let me walk away.”

“True,” he agreed. “But I’ll make you my personal prisoner.”

“Is that a thing?” she asked with a half-laugh. 

“It will be,” he told her. “I’ll have you taken to my chambers, and have beautiful things brought,” he kissed her neck. “For you to wear,” another kiss. “And let them believe I’m breaking you,” his hand slid down to her waist. “All while I keep you safe and mine.”

She almost laughed. For a moment she thought it was a joke but with him touching her like this, their bond lay open and she got a clear image in his mind of her laying on his bed, wearing only a black leather collar, a few scraps of lace, and with her hands bound above her head.

She pulled away from him and shut him out from the bond. She didn’t want to see more. She didn’t want him to know that it had excited her just a little. It definitely should not have excited her.

“You’ve thought about this a lot,” she said redirecting her anger at herself for her reaction towards him.

“Well, I. . .” It was hard to be able to tell in the firelight, but she thought maybe he was blushing. “Mostly before. . .”

Before they crashed on this planet, she finished the thought. 

“So what?” she asked. “You chased me here to this godforsaken planet so you could make me your sex slave?”

“We were enemies,” he said as if that’s all the justification that was needed.

That actually hurt. It wasn’t that he was wrong, they were on different sides of a war. But it wasn’t as simple as them just being enemies. Even before this planet, she had shared more with him than with anyone else in her life.

“Yes, but if you were captured by the Resistance no one was going to make you into a sex slave,” she argued back.

He snorted. “No, you would put me in a deep dark cell while you all argued about what to do with me. At least until some ‘brave’ soldier decided to kill me in my sleep.”

  


* * *

  


He had been wrong, she thought to herself as she watched his unconscious form. They weren’t going to argue about what to do with him. They had all made up their minds very quickly.


	2. Bad Ideas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Leia must explain why she can't determine Kylo Ren's fate.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey look. I set up a [tumblr](https://clock-work-crow.tumblr.com/) Which is currently very sparse. Haven't done this sort of thing since Live Journal was the hot new thing.

“We could just let him go,” Rey said. 

Poe laughed as if she had made a joke.

“No I’m serious,” she said and everyone looked at her. “Look, I’ve been catching up on what I missed these last couple months. During the time Kylo Ren and I were stranded on that planet the First Order has been consolidating its power. They’ve been more focused and more deadly without Kylo Ren.”

“They’ve been gathering power ever since Crait,” Poe argued. “Because we haven’t been there to stop them. But we can show the Galaxy that we captured Kylo Ren. This is our best chance to give people hope that fighting back really is an option.”

“She might have a point though,” Finn said reluctantly. “Hux and Ren were famous for hating and disagreeing with each other. It was Snoke that kept them both in line. It might cause a lot of chaos giving them back their Supreme Leader. I don’t think Hux is likely to give up any power he’s gained as the acting Supreme Leader lightly.”

“Maybe he can be reasoned with,” Rey said. “The two of us had a. . . truce on that planet. Maybe it can be the start of something more?”

“A truce is maybe pushing it,” Finn said. “He is Kylo Ren. And sure maybe he didn’t murder you-“

“He didn’t just **not** murder me,” Rey interrupted. “Within the first few minutes on that planet, he saved my life.” She took a deep breath. She wasn’t going to tell them everything that happened. They wouldn’t understand, but maybe, just maybe they could see that he wasn’t completely a monster.  


  


* * *

  
**Gavin V The day of the Crash**

Rey angled her ship low, feeling almost blinded by the overwhelming blue of this planet. The sun was a deep bright blue orb that hung in a light blue sky. And the ocean well, maybe it was a darker shade of blue than the sun or sky but it was still blue. At least the dark contrast helped her as she pulled up at the last minute sending a spray of seawater to either side of her ship as she tried to escape the last of the First Order ships in pursuit. She had hoped that once she had led them to this uninhabited system, and not back the Resistance they would give up the chase.

It was a vain hope, after all, they were being led by Kylo Ren.

She didn’t need to see the TIE Silencer to know it was him. She could feel him, although she was careful to keep their bond closed rather than risk him being able to predict what she would do.

There had been two wingmen, and Rey had felt elated at her own skill as she’d been able to deal with them, leaving only Kylo Ren’s TIE Silencer in pursuit.

But her elation was short-lived, as she realized that Ren had been holding back. He knew they were evenly matched in the Force, and she had bested him when they had crossed lightsabers. He needed it to be a fair fight. He needed to test his skills as a pilot against hers to prove that he was better. Now that it was just the two of them, he was no longer holding back.

Her ship dodged and wove low across the waves as she tried to find a way to get the upper hand. Then she saw it, two small rounded mountains cresting above the sea. She aimed her ship between them. Just as she was about to make a sharp turn around the mountain on the left it moved.

That’s no mountain, she realized seconds too late, as the fin of the giant sea creature stung out and smashed against her ship.

For a second everything was smoke and alarms, then the emergency systems took over, ejecting her out of the ship. For a second she hung in the air as her parachute unfurled. Kylo Ren had made the same miscalculation she had, but it wasn’t much comfort seeing him dodge out of the way of the first beast only to be struck by the fin of the second one.

She didn’t have much time to think about that however as the roar of the air was silenced by a dull roar, the world went dark and hazy, and she could no longer breathe. 

She was still strapped into the ejection seat, which was beginning to sink under the water even as the currents pulled against the parachute.

Rey wasn’t normally given to panic. But she’d never been fully submerged in water in her entire life. She didn’t expect the way it closed about her, the way it pulled at her; uncertainty about which way was up and down. Not to mention being unable to breathe. But for just a moment, this was all too much.

Then her survival instincts kicked in. She needed to get out of the seat. She could at least focus on the immediate threat. She managed to undo the buckles that held her in place. Once she was free she was able to orient herself as the ejection seat continued to fall towards the ocean floor. Far above her she could see oddly refracted light.

But how far?

She thrashed her arms and legs, in the best imitation of swimming she knew. But if she was making progress she couldn’t tell. Her lungs were starting to burn. 

This is how I die, Rey thought sadly as the strength left her arms.

She was losing the battle against her own body. Her mind knew she didn’t dare breathe, it would only drown her, but her lungs fought her, and she realized she wouldn’t be able to keep her mouth closed much longer. It was like pressure was building inside her, and it would force her to breathe in the ocean at any second.

And then something grabbed her from behind. The strange floating emptiness of the water was replaced with something hard and firm at her back.

She was past the ability to fight or struggle. Whatever it was, she was just grateful that something in the world was solid again. Water began to fill her mouth. . .

And then the world exploded with light and sound and air. She was coughing as her head broke the surface. The blue sun became bright, the waves were roaring and she was alive. 

With air, the desire to fight came back, and she began to struggle against whatever was holding her.

“Stop that!” a familiar voice said. “Or I’ll shove you back under.”  


  


* * *

  
“Look, I’m glad he saved you, Rey,” Poe said as she finished. “But that doesn’t change the rest of it. We can’t just let him get away with the things he’s done. We have to show the First Order that what they are doing is unacceptable. That there are consequences.”

“Careful Poe,” General Organa’s tone was firm but still kind. “This is dangerous ground,” She never said much when the issue of Kylo Ren’s trial came up. Mostly she asked questions. Were they actually going to make sure it was a fair and lawful trial? Were they sure the transmissions couldn’t be traced?

As far as Rey knew Leia had not been to see her son. But then neither had Rey. He was being closely monitored for fear he would escape. If either of them went to see him, their conversations would be recorded as a matter of course.

“We. . . I failed to help heal the Galaxy after the Empire fell.” The General continued. “I’ve been where you are now when it feels like all that matters is the fight. But something has to come afterward, otherwise what’s the point. The Rebellion won the war, but it turns out we lost the peace.”

“So you saying we cancel the trial?” Poe asked. “We’ve put so much effort into getting everything right. . .”

This was the moment, Rey knew, the moment when it could all be stopped. All General Organa had to do was say the word and the trial would be canceled. Poe wouldn’t like it, but he wouldn’t oppose her.

Leia took a deep breath and closed her eyes, clearly struggling with what to do. It was uncharacteristic for her.

“I don’t know,” the General said, shocking everyone in the room. “The only thing I’m certain of is. . . I’m the one person in the Galaxy who can’t make this choice. It’s too personal.”

Poe misunderstood. “We’re trying to get you justice, for Captain Solo. For everyone else, he’s killed.”

Leia just shook her head sadly. “I don’t know that Han would have wanted what you call justice. I. . .” Her voice trailed off. For a moment she seemed weak, almost defeated, but then she found her resolve once again. “This trial. . . It’s not going to go the way you think it is. I don’t know what’s going to happen, but I would be a fool to assume. . . I haven’t been fully honest with you, and now’s the time to change that.”

Leia looked around the room, making sure she had everyone’s attention.

She took one more deep breath, gathering her strength before finally saying, “Kylo Ren is my son.”

The room was completely silent for a minute.

“I don’t understand,” Poe was the first to speak. “I thought your son was massacred with the other Jedi Skywalker was training?”

“I lost Ben that day,” Leia said. “But not to death, to the Dark Side. He was the one who rose up against Luke. He was the one who burned the temple down.”

Rey stiffened. ‘Leia doesn’t know,’ she realized. His mother had no idea why Ben had turned against Luke, or more accurately that Luke had turned against him.

Should she speak up? Should she say something? It didn’t seem like the right time. Leia looked so vulnerable, as the people who had admired her and looked to her for wisdom and guidance only moments ago now looked at her as if she was a complete stranger.

Leia didn’t need to hear this now. And Rey wasn’t exactly sure it was her story to tell anyway.

“Who else knows?” Poe asked.

“Not many people. It happened not that long after I was outed as Darth Vader’s daughter. I didn’t exactly have a close circle of friends at the time. Admiral Akbar knows, Chewie of course. . . Rey knows.”

“Wait you knew this?” Finn asked her. “And you didn’t say anything?”

Rey shrugged. “It never really came up. It’s not like anyone ever asked me ‘Who do you think Kylo Ren’s mother is?’”

“How many people did he kill when the Jedi temple was destroyed?” Poe asked suddenly.

And Rey realized that what he’d taken away from all this was that he now had new crimes to accuse Kylo Ren of.

“I’m not sure,” Leia admitted. “There wasn’t a lot of contact with the temple. And they weren’t big record keepers. By the time Luke let us know what had happened he had. . . He had already cremated all the students that had died, according to Jedi tradition. By the time we got there . . . He had already disappeared.”

“We could send someone there, see what they could gather. I’ll talk to the prosecution about adding more charges,” Poe said.

Rey didn’t know a lot about trials. Justice on Jakku was carried out by the strong. They didn’t really have a judicial system. But in the rest of the Galaxy, it seemed evidence and witnesses were important.

These last few weeks had been a constant push and pull between wanting to get the trial started quickly, so it could be finished, and making sure they had witnesses and evidence to present against Kylo Ren.

“Don’t!” Rey said without thinking. “You won’t find what you are looking for.”

Poe looked at her surprised, then nodded. “You’re right. There may not be anything there, and I’d hate to delay for nothing. Besides,” he looked at Leia. “I don’t think we need to bring attention to Kylo Ren’s family. It won’t do anyone any good.” He paused and suddenly he looked very young and unsure. “General I’m sorry but. . . I don’t think you can be part of this anymore.”

Leia nodded and stood up. “You’re right.” She paused as she got to the door and turned back for a moment. “Thank you,” she said.

“For what General?” Poe asked surprised. 

“You have no idea how many people turned against me when they discovered who my biological father was. A man I . . . I only met a few times. Who captured me, tortured me, and then destroyed my planet. I wasn’t to blame for his actions. But. . . I can’t pretend I’m not responsible for who my son grew up to be. Thank you for. . .”

“General,” Poe shifted uncomfortably in his seat. “I think you misunderstood me. I didn’t just mean the trial I... We’ll wait till it’s over and figure out what to do then.” he finished.

“Yes,” Leia said wearily. “Of course.”


	3. Poison

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kylo is not very good at sitting back and not interfering.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I know I've posted these first few chapters very close to each other. From now on the plan is to post a chapter every Saturday.

**Garnik V 10 days after the crash**

"Look out," Kylo yelled, knocking her out of the way.

He had decided that they need to venture deeper into the jungle. Supposedly this was some sort of hunting mission, meant to help them find food. Not that Rey hadn't found several edible plants for them to eat. 

Deep down, she wondered if he was really hoping to find some abandoned ruins from some unknown civilization and a way off the planet.

The creature wasn't that big, the size of a small child, and Rey didn't think it was trying to attack, so much as trying to scare them away. But it still had a single long wicked claw at the end of each limb. A claw long enough to be a dangerous weapon.

The claw slid across Kylo Ren's upper arm as he pushed Rey away, and she could hear the tearing of fabric as it cut through his sleeve.

"Hey!" she protested. She could take care of herself, thank you very much.

He ignited his lightsaber although it wasn't exactly a good weapon for hunting mid-sized animals. He tried to cut the creature down, but it quickly scampered up the tree, the long nails had evolved to help the creature climb. The lightsaber cut through the tree, causing it to topple, but the creature was already leaping to the next and disappearing deeper into the canopy of red leaves.

"What were you saying about being an excellent hunter?" she said, annoyed. Once again, he should have let her continue to provide for them.

She had been doing just fine foraging for food the last week or so, while he had been wasting time trying to swim out to the wreckage of one of their ships to recover some equipment.

She had told him from the beginning it was a waste of time. He kept pointing out he'd been able to make the swim from where they'd wrecked to the island, all while towing her, so clearly he could make the swim back to the wreckage. He seemed to ignore the fact that it wasn't just a matter of swimming out to the wreck, but down however far it had sunk.

Rey was pretty sure it was an insane plan, but if Kylo Ren was determined to drown himself, who was she to stop him? And if he did manage to salvage something. . ?

But he hadn't. Finally, he'd given up and gotten the idea to go hunting in the woods, and for some reason, she had to come along.

"I'll get the next one," he said, confident for a moment. Then suddenly he was swaying on his feet. He tried to steady himself against a tree but ended up sliding down the trunk to sit heavily on the ground.

"How bad did that thing get you?" she asked, concerned. 

"Just a scratch," he told her.

But she was determined to look for herself. She didn't think about it as she began to unfasten his tunic so she could look at his arm. The planet could be cold at times, and they didn't have a handy supply of clothes, so she wasn't going to tear what he had just to look at an injury.

Besides, it wasn't anything she hadn't seen before and seen quite frequently. He always stripped down before his swimming trips, although at least he kept on his underwear.

_‘And yet he calls me the beautifully obscene one,' _ she thought, pushing away the humiliating memory of their first night on the island.

She was half surprised he didn't make some comment about her undressing him. But when she looked at his face, she could tell that something was very wrong with him. He was trying very hard to regulate his breathing. When she looked at his arm, she could see why.

It was barely more than a scratch. But the skin around the wound was black, and she could see his veins turning black under the skin as the poison moved through them.

"I think the damn thing is venomous," he said with a half-laugh. "I guess it wouldn't make a good meal after all."

"No," Rey said, looking at the tree Kylo had cut down, and the black sap leaking out of it. "It isn't the creature, it's the trees. It just got the sap on its claws."

"Just be quiet," he hissed at her. 

She was about to snap at him, but then she realized he was concentrating, trying to draw in the Force. 

Specifically, she realized he was trying to draw in the Light. He was trying to heal himself. For just a moment she felt and observed what he was trying to do before laughing.

"That's never going to work," she told him. He looked like he wanted to protest, but he was too weak. The poison was working fast. "Let me," she said.

It wasn't that what he was trying to do was wrong. As soon as she had seen what he was trying to do, she understood it completely. It was just that Kylo Ren was never going to be able to draw on enough of the Light to heal himself, especially while dying. Luckily for him, that was not a problem for her.

She had never tried healing with the Force before. She hadn't even known it was a thing until a moment ago. But then she hadn't known how to read someone's mind until he had captured her and tried to read hers. She had always been a quick study. Besides, drawing on the Light was easy for her. She placed her hands near the wound and concentrated. She concentrated on the black poison that was making its way through his veins.

She focused on the nearby tree stump that was slowly weeping the same poison sap and aligned herself with it; explored its nature, then felt how it was different from Kylo Ren's. That made it easy to separate the two. To draw the poison out through the wound even though it had already traveled deep into his system.

She followed the black substance through his veins, deeper and deeper into him. Stopping it just before it could make its way to his heart and be pumped throughout his whole being.

Molecule by molecule she pulled it out of him. It wasn't that much after all, just very virulent. And once it was gone, she saw to repairing the damage it had done. Cleaning up the damaged cells and finally knitting back together the damaged skin on his arm until there was no sign he had ever been scratched, except for the sticky black mess that now ran down his arm.

"There," she said satisfied. "I think you should leave the Light side stuff to me."

"Light side stuff?" he asked. "Do you have any idea how difficult Force healing is? Do you know how remarkable you are?"

He was looking at her in amazement, and his praise made her blush. She tried to look away, but he caught her cheek with his hand, and before she realized what was happening, he was kissing her, and she was kissing him back.  


* * *

  
The door opened, and Kylo Ren stepped forward into the courtroom. Rey could feel everyone in the room tense as fear and anticipation rolled over them, and she supposed she couldn't blame them.

Even with his hands bound in front of him, Kylo Ren was intimidating. He tended to hunch his shoulders when he walked as if he was trying to hide his true height; but not today. Today he walked tall and proud as if this was his throne room and not the place he was to be put on trial.

Maybe, she thought, they should have given him something else to wear, to make him look more like a prisoner, and less like the Supreme Leader.

But when she noticed the stitching on his left sleeve where she had sown up his tunic after he'd nearly been killed by one of the climbers on Garnik V, she was oddly glad that he was wearing the old tunic. It was a reminder that Garnik V had been real. 

On closer examination, she realized that his clothes were in a bad state. The absolute black had faded to a dark grey in several places where seawater and rain had taken their toll on the dye.

And yet even in slightly rumbled, slightly torn, slightly stained clothing, everyone else was still afraid of Kylo Ren.

He would have loved the nervous fear from the crowd if he could have sensed it; it would have only fed his power. But the binders he wore cut him off the Force. Rey had found them in an old Jedi temple she'd found while she'd been trying to figure out how to build her own lightsaber. When she'd come back to base, Finn had teased her about all the 'junk' she brought back. But her scavenger instincts had told her someday it would all be useful. 

She still didn't know what some of the items were for, but the binders at least were proving invaluable. Without them, they could never hope to hold Kylo Ren prisoner.

But they didn't just block him from his powers, they also blocked their Force bond. And Rey didn't know how she felt about that. In the time between Crait and Garnik V, she had kept the bond shut, kept him out.

That had proved impossible in the close quarters of Garnik V, and even though she hadn't seen him since he'd been imprisoned on the base, she knew that being on the same planet would have the same effect. 

Part of her was glad, she wasn't sure she wanted him in her head right now, but part of her was deeply lonely. She missed his presence.

Rey wasn't sure exactly what she'd expected from a trial. Someone would say all the bad things Kylo Ren had done. They would show the evidence that they'd been gathering, and then the people they called the jury would execute him. 

At least that's how it played out in her mind. She'd realized these last few weeks that everyone else seemed to have a very good idea of what was going to happen, but not her. They used words that she both understood, but also realized she didn’t have the full context for, like, _Prosecutor_, and _Defense, charges,_ and _plea._ Somehow The Defense was a person also sometimes called an attorney or counselor, but Kylo Ren was not the Defense. Instead, it was the nervous young man who stood next to Kylo Ren as the 'charges' were read out loud.

She had not expected the whole thing to be so. . . ceremonial. So much work had been put in ahead of time, that she assumed the trial itself would be a quick and perfunctory thing. But as everyone stood and sat at specific times, she felt like she was the spectator to some ancient ritual.

"How does the defendant plead?" the Judge asked, and Rey wondered who talked like that? And why was he wearing such a funny hat and bright robes?

"You're Honor, the-"

"A point of order, Your Honor," Kylo Ren interrupted The Defense.

Evidently, he wasn't supposed to do that, because a murmur ran through the crowd. As interruptions from Kylo Ren went, it was a very polite one, but even so, the Judge felt a need to slam a small club on the surface of his desk several times.

"Do not think I am going to let you turn this into a circus," the Judge told Kylo Ren. "This is a court of law, and you will respect the dignity of the court."

"Nothing would please me more, Your Honor," Kylo Ren said, but his tone was anything but amicable. "But that's just the problem, Your Honor. No one has told me under what jurisdiction or court I'm being charged. How can I respect the dignity of the Court if I don't know which Court I'm being tried under? After all, the crimes I'm accused of were committed on a variety of worlds, and under Article 6 of the New Republic Constitution each planet has the right to maintain its own justice system and any citizen of the New Republic will be tried on the planet where any crimes they are accused of were committed."

"I never thought he listened," Leia whispered under her breath.

Rey was confused by the whole thing, but it seemed to have upset several other people in the courtroom as people began to whisper.

The Judge banged the club again. "Order," he shouted, and everyone fell silent. "It is true that Article 6 does maintain the right of planets to have their own legal system. But," the Judge emphasized that word. "It also recognizes the possibility of a criminal undertaking that can span several worlds. In this case, the Senate can appoint a special consolidated court headed by a judge from the world the most serious crimes were committed on, who is charged to respect the laws of all affected planets.

He paused. "And before you ask, I am from Hosnian Prime. I was off-world when the system was destroyed. Clearly, the worst of your crimes were committed against the Hosnian system. And before you ask about Senate authority, many worlds had clear lines of succession in case something happened to their Senators. Although a full Senate is not currently in session, we were able to contact a quorum of interim Senators and get approval for this trial to go forward. But thank you," 

A few people gasped when the Judge said that.

"It is best to clear up the unusual circumstances of this trial and make it clear that these are legal and sanctioned proceedings. Now may we continue with the plea?"

Kylo looked down at the Defense, and the young man started to stammer, "Your Honor, the Defendant-"

But Kylo interrupted him again. "A correction, Your Honor. Should the record not state that they are my **alleged** crimes against Hosnian System?"

"Apologies," the Judge said, sounding anything but apologetic. "Let the record be amended to say his alleged crimes."

"What does alleged mean?" Rey whispered to Leia.

Leia looked surprised but whispered back kindly. "It means he's accused of the crimes, but it hasn't been proven yet. And that he needs a better attorney."

That seemed like a very awkward word to Rey, and she wasn't sure she quite understood why it was so important. 

"Now if we can continue," the Judge said.

"One final Point of Order, Your Honor," Kylo Ren said. The Judge raised his club, but before he could slam it down, Kylo Ren hurriedly added, "Unless you are trying to force me into perjury?"

When the Judge hesitated Rey whispered, "What's perjury?" 

"Lying to a court," Leia responded. "It's a serious crime."

"Perjury?" the Judge asked.

"I'm being accused of a capital crime on Silas III," Kylo Ren explained. "Since this is a consolidated court, I assume their perjury laws apply?"

The Judge nodded warily.

"Silas III values family above all else, and as such close blood relatives are also held responsible for crimes. One of the reasons I'm told capital crimes are so rare there."

Rey could feel Leia stiffen beside her.

**Please don't Ben,** she tried to send the thought to him. But the binders kept her plea from him.

Kylo hurried on before he wore out the Judge's patience. "As such, any attempt to hide a close familial relationship is considered an act of perjury. Not to mention that in the New Republic, my legal name is Ben Solo. I just want it to be clear that I am not in any way hiding the fact that I'm the son of General Leia Organa or committing any acts of perjury under the laws of Silas III."

And the courtroom exploded with noise as everyone turned to look at General Organa.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hopefully, my made-up legal system for the Galaxy isn't too boring. I imagine that the New Republic took on a lot of the laws of the Old Republic, but there were also significant changes. Specifically, that people like Senator Organa wanted to preserve the independence of planets and avoid too much-centralized power. I'm basing her political views on the book Bloodlines.
> 
> Silas III is purely my invention.
> 
> And this was the only image of a [Star Wars judge](https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/starwars/images/2/2e/Cinnagar_Overflow_Courtroom_4_FotSE2.png/revision/latest?cb=20180414022127) I could find.


	4. Broken Religions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "No," Leia continued. "The last thing I am going to do is undermine the very system of laws I built. The Empire liked to prosecute only the crimes of its enemies, and ignore the ones of its allies. We are better than that."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for the kudos and comments. They've gotten me to write another couple of chapters. I know I just said I'd post on Saturdays, but maybe it would be better to say I'll at least post on Saturdays. It is a holiday weekend after all.

Chaos had erupted in the courtroom after Kylo Ren had told everyone his real name was Ben Solo. Some of those who were seated next to Rey and Leia had pulled away from them. Other people had started yelling at the General. The mood in the room turned ugly, and soon Rey was pulling the General out of the courtroom, using the Force to keep a tight shield around them so no one could actually touch the General.

All the while, the Judge was banging away, trying to regain order.

She wasn't actually sure that anyone would attack Leia, but she didn't want to risk it.

As they exited the room she had looked over her shoulder back at Kylo Ren, he seemed to be smirking in a self-satisfied kind of way, and she really wanted to throw something substantial at his head.

Not long after they left the courtroom, they were summoned by the Judge.

The Prosecution and the Defense were also in the room.

"Who is she?" the Judge asked, nodding towards Rey.

"I'm guarding the General," she said, realizing the Judge wanted to get rid of her. She didn't like the idea of leaving Leia alone with these people.

"She is also the Jedi who captured Ky- my son Ben Solo," Leia said.

"So it's true?" the Judge asked.

"Yes, it's true," Leia acknowledged.

"I am so sorry, Princess . . . uh General," the young defense attorney said.

"You should be," Leia said her voice unforgiving. "It shouldn't be up to my son to object when Judge presumes he's guilty." She turned her attention to the Judge. "And I'm worried about your impartiality."

"We're not the ones on trial here," the Judge responded angrily. "And don't pretend to know-"

"What it's like to be one of the few survivors of the destruction of your entire planet?" Leia asked.

That shut the Judge up for a moment.

"I'm sorry about Silas III," the defense attorney said to Leia. "He brought up an incident on Silas III, and I thought it was my duty to report it to the court."

"Which is just one more reason you are fired," Leia said.

"You can't-"

"You would now be representing me, as well. If I'm going to be punished for my son's crimes, I should have some say in our defense."

"Where do you think you're going to find someone else who will defend Kylo Ren?" the young attorney said, sticking up for himself. "I'm the best you've got."

"Your Honor," Lies addressed the Judge. "All I need is a couple days to arrange for a proper defense attorney."

"Or we could just drop the charges from Silas III," the Prosecutor said. 

The last week or so, Rey had been busy dodging this woman and her constant requests for interviews. Her name was Kiandra Kappa. She was a tall woman, with severe features and salt and pepper hair tied in a perfect bun at the top of her head. She was also one of the most well-dressed people Rey had ever met. She always wore dark formal robes, and she had an air of authority and power that Rey found a bit unsettling, even if there didn't seem to be anything malicious about the woman.

This was a woman who was used to being listened to. But her power didn't come from the kind of violence or fear Rey had grown up around. But then neither did she have General Organa's quiet air of authority. It was a power, and confidence Rey didn't entirely understand, and it unsettled her.

"It was never my intent to bring any charges against you, Your Highness," Kappa continued. "If I had been aware of your relationship, I never would have brought up the charges from Silas III. They have a unique outlook on justice, that seems to work for them, but I'm not sure it should be applied to outsiders."

"Do you believe he really massacred a village there?" Leia asked quietly, some of her earlier fire having faded.

"The evidence is fairly strong, although somewhat circumstantial," Kappa admitted. "We haven't yet been able to find any eyewitnesses, but there may be a recording of the events. We're trying to get our hands on them now."

"Then you can't drop the charges," Leia said resolutely. "I should have put a stop to this before it started, and **not**, because he's my son. But because we shouldn't be doing this in the middle of a war.

"But it's too late for that now. I fought hard to get Article 6 passed, to make sure that we continued to respect the laws and customs of all planets, instead of allowing the Imperial Court system to continue. People have a right to be judged by their own laws, and visitors to other planets need to respect those laws.

"No," Leia continued. "The last thing I am going to do is undermine the very system of laws I built. The Empire liked to prosecute only the crimes of its enemies, and ignore the ones of its allies. We are better than that."

"An admiral sentiment, Senator," the Judge said. "And I'm inclined to agree. The Court is sacred, and although this trial has had a rocky start, I intend to make sure it goes off without reproach. Clearly, Mr. Wran," he nodded to the young attorney. "Is not capable of controlling his client, and I don't intend to let Kylo Ren turn this court into his own private circus.

"You have two days, Senator Organa, to find a new attorney who is willing to travel here. I understand that the travel arrangements are necessarily . . . difficult. So as soon as you have found someone, we will see about bringing them here and setting a new date to resume the trial. But we can not wait indefinitely."

"Thank you, Your Honor. I think I'll have a name for you sooner than you might think."

"I hope so," the Judge said before dismissing them all.

As they left the Judge's chamber, Rey asked Leia, "Is it a religion?"

"What?" Leia asked clearly deep in her own thoughts.

"The trial, the Courts. Is it some sort of religion? Is that why there's all the ceremony, and the strange words and special robes?"

Leia laughed. "I suppose it is a kind of religion to a lot of people. It's certainly something you need to have faith in. You've never. . . Well, I guess most people have never been to a trial before. But you don't know much about it, do you?"

Rey shook her head, feeling silly. Just one more thing the scavenger from Jakku didn't know.

"They didn't really have trials on Jakku," she said. "If someone wronged you, you were responsible for taking care of it yourself.

"Then I guess I better teach you. I think you're going to need to understand what's going on to make it through this unscathed." Leah said. "I just have a few calls to make first."

"I'm sorry," Rey said. "I don't want to trouble you, you have so much-"

"It's not a trouble," Leia said. "It'll keep my mind off things. I may have never liked the politicking, but I always loved the legislation. I'd love to teach you, just let me know if I'm boring you to death. Although," she added with a slight smile. "Ben my have considered me boring, but I'm betting he's glad he knows a few things about the New Republic constitution and the Articles of Law now."  


* * *

  
**Garnik V 11 days after the crash.**

"Stop it!" Rey said.

"What?" Kylo Ren asked, annoyed her. "Am I sitting wrong now too?"

It was a bit of a sore spot. Rey had a way of doing things. A way she had always done things when she'd gone on longer scavenging trips and had to camp in the desert. There was a way things should be done when surviving on a dangerous world. And Kylo Ren couldn't seem to get any of them right.

"No, looking at me," she told him.

Ever since the kiss they absolutely didn't talk about, she regularly caught him looking at her. Which should have been better after all the time he had spent not looking at her. But it was a different kind of uncomfortable.

He only shrugged. "I forget, sometimes, that's all."

"To not stare at people like a jerk?" she asked.

"How truly marvelous it all is," he corrected her. She looked at him in confusion. "The Force. Sometimes it's easy to think of it just as a tool. To forget that it has a place and a purpose for all of us. Just how miraculous it is to have been chosen by it."

Rey only shook her head. "You make it sound like a religion."

He chuckled, "Skywalker really didn't teach you anything did he?" She glared at him. She was not going to tell him what Master Luke had or hadn't taught her. "The Jedi were a religious order. A militant one, but a religious order none the less."

Rey thought about the people back on Jakku who worshiped Niima the Hutt. "That's not what religion is," she told him. "It's lots of rules and ceremonies, and people telling you what you can and can't do, and how to live your life. And often funny clothes."

"I would argue that's what a cult is. Also an excellent description of the Jedi." He paused for a moment then said, "Most people equate religion with creation stories, gods, and the afterlife. But it's really about the underlying truth of existence. You can't really believe in the Force without believing it's what binds everything together."

"But it's not belief," Rey protested. "The Force is as real as gravity."

"Spoken like a true religious fanatic," he teased her. "But yes, it is real, which is evident to us but not to most people. Most people in Galaxy will never feel the Force, never see it being used. Most people are allowed to go through their lives without worrying about what the universe has planned for them. Most people are allowed to think that _The Truth_ is some unknowable thing beyond their grasp. And for most of them, it is.

"Agnosticism isn't really something we're allowed though is it?" he asked. "When you can feel the currents of the Galaxy moving around you, there are only two choices. Fight against them, or accept them."

"You've thought about this a lot," she said with surprise.

He seemed like the sort of person who went through life in a whirlwind of violence, and not one who thought about the nature of truth and religion.

He laughed. "You really really **don't** know anything about Jedi training." He could see her about to object, and he quickly added, "It was lots of philosophy, meditation, and indoctrination into the holy war we were supposed to be fighting."

"Yes because Snoke never indoctrinated anyone," she said sarcastically, before realizing that she was tired and maybe she didn't want to pick a fight tonight.

But he didn't say anything; he didn't argue. He was just looking at her again, which at least reminded her about how this had all started.

"You're staring again," she told him.

"You really don't know what a marvel you are, do you?" his voice sounded sad. "You're at peace with yourself. You're not trying to stamp out the Darkness or the Light. You're just you."

At peace with herself was not how Rey thought of herself at all. Especially since she had come here; since she'd been forced to be close to Kylo Ren.

But then again, when you were a tempest of emotions they way Kylo Ren was, she supposed she had to look pretty peaceful after all.


	5. Exposure

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Leia refuses to hide. Rey remembers her first night on the Garnik V.

Rey had spent most of the morning in General Organa’s quarters. Leia had called her early in the day and told her that she could explain the legal system, or at least the basics of it if Rey were still interested.

Rey was more than happy to; especially since it made yet another good excuse to not to meet with Counselor Kappa. The Prosecution wanted to interview her about her testimony, and Rey figured this was an excellent time to learn what that meant.

She had been surprised though; she had thought the General would be busy finding an attorney. The Judge had made it sound like it would be hard for Leia to get one.

When Rey asked about it, and the General had smiled and said, “I still know a lot of people,” but then she had turned serious. “I know you’re a bit of a loaner Rey, but if you want some advice. Learn about people. Not just what they do, but who they are and why they do the things they do. People aren’t simple Rey; they are a web of connections and obligations. You never know when one of those connections will be the one you need.”

Rey only nodded. She had no idea how she would ever act on such advice. Rey knew she was among good people now, but there was too much of the scavenger in her. Too much fear that if she let her guard down, they would steal from her, not that she had anything to take.

On Jakku, she had to fight for everything she had. Here everything was just given to her. Not that she asked for anything beyond food and a place to sleep. But it still amazed her that as long as she showed up during the correct hours, she could go to the mess hall and eat as much as she wanted.

Such as lunchtime.

“If you want I could bring something back for you,” Rey offered the General.

“I’m not going to hide in my room,” Leia said firmly. 

As they headed to the mess hall, Leia smiled and told her, “The first time I went out in public after everyone found out about my biological father, I wore a long black dress.” She chuckled. “I figured if they were only going to see Darth Vader’s daughter, why not let them see Darth Vader’s daughter.”

“And what happened?” Rey asked.

“Nothing,” Leia said. “The people who were going to shun me shunned me anyway. And my real friends still talked to me.”

“Oh,” Rey said, confused about why it had made Leia chuckle. Maybe it was another joke she didn’t get. She often missed out on references to Galactic culture that had never made their way to Jakku.

“Is something wrong?” Leia asked.

For the hundredth time, Rey was grateful for the General’s friendship, the way the General never seemed to judge her for her past, but also didn’t ignore or trivialize it. Leia seemed to understand that Jakku was a part of Rey, it would always be a part of Rey, and that was fine.

“You laughed, I thought maybe it was going to be a joke of some sort.”

“When you get older,” Leia told her, “You either learn to laugh at your mistakes, or you let them overwhelm you.”

“So the dress was a bad idea?”

“No,” the General admitted. “The dress was a brilliant idea. Hiding who I was was the bad idea. Especially hiding it from Ben.”

Rey thought about that. She wondered if someday she would be Leia’s age and would be laughing at the time she crashed on Garnik V and had an affair with Kylo Ren. It didn’t seem funny at all now, but maybe someday it would be a great joke.

When they entered the mess hall, it went silent for a moment. Then slowly, the conversations started back up. Even so, Rey could tell people were watching the General warily.

The General chose an empty table in the corner, and Rey sat across from her. 

They had just started eating when suddenly Rose and Finn appeared. 

“Mind if we join you?” Finn said. “Uh Ma’am?” he said, addressing Leia. Even after all these months he still somehow found it difficult to navigate the less strict military system of the Resistance. Rank mattered but didn’t absolutely divide the officers of the Resistance the way it did among the First Order.

“I’d welcome the company,” Leia said graciously.

Finn had become one of the great heroes of the Resistance. The Stormtrooper who left the First Order. But none of them had ever sat and eaten with General Organa before, (although that was because she was usually to busy to take her meals in the mess hall) it didn’t go unnoticed they were sitting with her now.

“Well go on,” Leia told Finn after a few minutes of them all eating in silence. “Whatever it is you want to ask, ask it.”

“What?” Finn said. “Oh, I didn’t have a question for you I just don’t get it. . . Why people are treating you like what Kylo Ren did was your fault. He’s his own person.”

Rose squeezed Finn’s hand and gave him a sad look, which only confused him more.

“A parent’s job is to teach their child their place in the world,” Leia explained. “To raise them to be a good person. Clearly, I failed in that.”

“Yeah but. . .” Finn was struggling to express himself, and Rey sympathized.

But Rey thought she understood. Neither of them had ever had the sort of family Leia was talking about.

“I’m not what the First Order wanted me to be,” he said at last. “And I don’t like to think that they made me who I am either. I mean they did but. . . I’m my own person. With my own choices. I’m not just my upbringing. . .” Finn trailed off helplessly as he saw the look on Leia’s face. “Sorry. I shouldn’t talk about families.”

“No,” Leia disagreed, “It’s okay. I think Ben would agree with you.” Finn gave her a sour look, and she laughed. “Sorry. It’s just. . .” She shook her head. “I’m not sure I can talk about this.”

“That’s okay General,” Rose said. “We didn’t sit here to pry, really. We just thought. . . We thought you could use some friends. I guess that’s silly.”

“No,” Leia said, and she reached over to squeeze Rose’s hand. “You couldn’t be more right.”

After that, they continued to eat in silence until the mess hall doors opened once more. This time Poe Dameron entered. He didn’t bother to grab a tray, he just walked over to their table and slung one leg over the bench so he could sit sideways and look at them.

“I’m glad I found you,” he said. “And that you’re here, Rey.”

She looked up curious.

“I heard you told the Judge yesterday that you were the General’s bodyguard,” Poe said.

“Oh?!” Rey said embarrassed to be caught in the lie. “Well, I-“

“I think that’s a great idea,” Poe said to Rey’s surprise. “Look, General, I don’t know. . . I still haven’t wrapped my head around all of this. But what I’m sure of is that none of us would be here today if it weren’t for you. But I’m not sure everyone sees it that way. . .

“But I am sure,” he continued. “It would be pretty disastrous if anything happened to you, not to mention, well I’d. . . I’d miss you.” He seemed a bit embarrassed by that. “So anyway. . . I thought having Rey as a bodyguard might be a good idea just until things calm down a bit. If that’s okay with you, Rey?”

“Yes,” Rey answered without hesitation.

She wasn’t sure if there was any real danger for Leia or not. But what she did know was the Leia was the only other person on this base who saw some of Ben Solo in Kylo Ren; who didn’t just see the monster.

Ever since she had returned from Gavin V, she had felt exposed. As if at any moment someone was going to see through her and realize she didn’t think of Kylo Ren as her mortal enemy. Leia didn’t have any idea what had happened on Gavin V, and Rey didn’t know what she’d say even if she wanted to tell her.

But at least if Leia ever did see through her, she was the only other person who understood that Kylo Ren was more than just the monster. That there was some of Ben Solo still leftover and hiding deep inside him.  


* * *

  
**Gavin V, The Day of the Crash**

“What are you doing?” Rey asked in horror as Kylo Ren undid the thick belt he wore over his tunic.

“Not freezing to death,” he said as he laid the belt across a rock and began to undo the fastenings on the tunic itself.

When they had first gotten to the beach, Kylo Ren had more or less collapsed, just out of reach of the water. It had been up to Rey to gather some wood to start a fire and make a crude camp. But since he’d done all the swimming, and brought them both safely to the island, she supposed it was fair. For the moment at least he had done his share of the work in keeping them alive.

Luckily by the time she had the fire going, he was rested enough that she didn’t have to drag him up to it; he had gotten up and walked. Then he started methodically wringing the water out of his cape and cowl before laying them out to dry. 

He’d also taken off his boots and done the same with his socks. All of that was fine. Although barefoot, Kylo Ren seemed vulnerable in a way that made her stomach do little flip-flops.

Shirtless Kylo Ren was a different thing entirely. Not that she hadn’t seen him that way before. The Force bond didn’t seem to care about knocking, but they had also been on other sides of the Galaxy at the time and hadn’t yet realized that they could touch through the bond.

But now they were only on other sides of a fire. And he was barefoot, shirtless, and oddly still wearing his gloves, which was very distracting somehow.

“You don’t seem that cold,” she told him as he began squeezing as much seawater as he could out of his tunic. 

“That’s because I’m not keeping my cold, wet clothes on,” he said, not looking at her. “You really should take those off before you catch your death of cold.”

“I am not undressing for you,” she said without thinking.

He looked up suddenly at her just a hint of a smile at one corner of his lips. The fire danced between them, and his gaze shifted, intensifying as if he could see every inch of her. She couldn’t tell if it was the glow of the fire, but she almost thought he might be blushing. Then he laughed nervously and looked away.

It nearly made her jump. It was possibly the most disturbing thing Kylo Ren could have done. He shook his head and went back to his task of drying his clothes. Now it was clear he was refusing to look at her.

“What?” she finally said annoyed. 

He made a point of not looking at her as he spoke. “You don’t really think you’re being modest, do you?”

“You don’t really think you’re going to trick me into undressing, do you?” she said, ignoring the part of her that was secretly pleased that he seemed to think she might be worth looking at.

He stood up and seemed almost angry, and then suddenly, he was on her side of the fire. He knelt behind her, his mouth by her ear and his hand on her waist. 

“I can see everything,” he said his voice low and dangerous his breathing ragged. “You’re hard little nipples, the exact curve of your breasts. Do you have any idea how beautifully obscene you are right now?” His hand tightened around her waist.

She scrambled away from him in a panic, refusing to admit to the flush that ran through her body at his words, or how it felt to have his hand on her waist. She grabbed her lightsaber from her belt to make it clear that he was not to touch her.

And then she saw her reflection in the chrome of the hilt. She changed her grip and looked in horror and the distorted reflection. It didn’t make much of a mirror, but she realized he was right. The water had made the fabric of her tunic practically transparent. Her nipples were not only almost poking out of the material as it clung to their exact shape, but she could make out the difference in the darker skin around them, and the paler skin of the rest of her breast.

Her cheeks turned bright red. She looked down and quickly crossed her arms over her chest. From this angle, it was even worse, even more, apparent just how little her clothing was doing to cover her up at the moment. She didn’t know what to do, how to recover from this humiliation.

“I’m sorry,” Kylo said his voice a low rumble.

She couldn’t quite bring herself to look at him. 

“I don’t frequent the officer clubs where. . . I’m not used to. . .” He didn’t seem prepared to deal with the situation either.

She could tell he was moving, but she was still too embarrassed to respond or do anything but look at the ground. Her toes at least weren’t indecent.

Then he was standing next to her again. She couldn’t help but look up afraid of what she would see, but he only seemed embarrassed. 

Once he saw she was looking at him, he turned around and held his hand straight out from his side, loosely holding his cloak.

“You can have this, just . . . Just please take off the wet top first.” He seemed almost to be pleading with her.

“Right, uh, just give me a moment,” she said, embarrassed.

Even though his back was turned, she turned her back to him just in case the Dark Side prompted him to peek. She quickly peeled off her wet clothing, letting them fall to the ground before wrapping the cloak around herself.

It was a little scratchy, and still kind of damp, but the fabric was much thicker than her own clothes, and she could wrap it around her to cover everything.

She turned around and saw that he had moved back to the fire, his back still to her.

“You can turn around now,” she said, as she picked up her wet clothes so she could wring them out and let them dry better.

He nodded but didn’t look at her as he returned to his side of the fire. 

“Good, I’m glad that’s. . . Taken care of.” He said at last.


	6. Friendship

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kylo Ren meets his new attorney

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In case the use of the 'they/them' pronoun seems confusing, this chapter introduces a non-binary character. More about that in the notes at the end of the chapter.
> 
> Also, I start using a convention here of having conversations that are being remembered in italics.
> 
> Please feel free to let me know in the comments if it's unclear (especially since it's just one word, but I think you'll know the moment).

"You look less ready for this than I do," Leia whispered to Rey as they waited in the hallway.

Rey struggled to find something to say. She suddenly felt like she owed Leia something; Leia had been such a good friend to her. And Leia had every right to be nervous about seeing her son for the first time in who knew how many years. But the new attorney had insisted.

Their name was Jaren Hennis, and Rey wasn't sure what to make of them. They arrived wearing similar robes to Kiandra Kappa, which Rey now knew were the sort of formal dress that attorneys were expected to wear in court. They were not young like the previous attorney. Possibly in their 40s, maybe older. They had olive skin, and short straight black hair cropped close to their chin.

Of course, they wanted to see Kylo Ren on their own first since he was their primary client. But Hennis also wanted to speak with them together since they could both be held culpable for the events on Silas III.

So while the attorney spoke with Kylo Ren, she and Leia waited in the hall.

The silence seemed uncomfortable, so finally, Rey said, "Yes, well, it's not easy having a nemesis."

"Is that what he is?" Leia asked, and Rey suddenly wondered how much the other woman suspected.

Rey didn't have to find an answer because the door opened and the attorney waved General Organa inside.

Rey automatically started to follow. She had gotten used to her new role as Leia's bodyguard rather quickly.

"Not you," Hennis told her. "Client attorney privilege."

"It's fine," Kylo Ren said.

And she realized he was right in front of her. His chair was positioned directly in front of the door; she supposed so anyone could look in through the tiny window and confirm he was there. He sat back from the table so that he had plenty of room to stretch his long legs. But now he sat up straight and turned his head so he could better see her in the doorway, and she couldn't help but think his gaze was. . . Hungry.

She hoped no one could tell the shiver that went down her spine.

"I can wait outside," she said.

"Nonsense," Kylo said. "I'm a dangerous and vicious criminal. I'll likely leap across this table and strangle the Princess the moment the door is closed unless you're here to protect her."

"As your attorney, I need to advise you not to threaten people. And I assume she will be called as a witness by the prosecution. I really can't have her in here while we talk."

"She's a Jedi guard," Kylo Ren countered. "Which means she bound by the Jedi Seal. So can't be called on to give testimony on any private conversation her charge has unless a crime is committed during the course of her performing her duties. That is unless the New Republic did away with those laws?" He addressed the last part to Leia, who had taken a seat across the table from him.

"No," Leia's said. "The New Republic simply adopted all the Old Republic's laws concerning the Jedi. He's right, as long as no one commits any new crimes in this room, she can't be called on to testify about what we say."

Hennis didn't seem to like it, but they stood aside and let Rey pass. Honestly, she wished they had put up more of a fight about the whole thing.

On the other hand, if she was supposed to be here as a guard, she decided the best place for her to stand was behind Kylo Ren; that way she could quickly stop him from doing anything without the table getting in her way.

He clearly didn't like this, because she could see him try twisting in his chair to get a look at her. "What are you doing?"

"Making sure you don't 'leap across this table and strangle the Princess.' I can stop you best from here."

He made an annoyed sound in the back of his throat, but he settled back in his chair. She had to try hard not to smile at the little victory. Not to mention being in the unusual position of being able to look down on Kylo Ren instead of the other way around.

"Now then," Hennis began as they took their seat. "I think there are a few things that we need to establish if I'm going to present a joint defense for you two, the first being, are you trying to get your mother killed?"

"What?" Kylo Ren actually seemed surprised by the question, although not offended the way a reasonable person would be.

"Although I think we should limit any discussion we have with anyone else present to your crimes on Silas III," Jaren Hennis began looking pointedly at Rey. "I think it only fair to point out that you are also accused of the murder of your father.

"And you volunteered the information about Silas III and your familial convection knowing that it would put your mother's life in danger. So again I ask, are you trying to get your mother killed?"

"I think I actually like you," Rey could hear the smile in Kylo's voice. "You assume the worst about me. However," Kylo Ren sat up and leaned forward, using his height to menace the small attorney. "_If_ the day comes that I decided to kill my mother, I assure you, it will be quite personal and. . . hands-on. I would never stoop to having her executed by a court."

He leaned back again, clearly done trying to threaten Hennis.

"Did you see by any chance the masterful performance of my last attorney?" Kylo's voice dripped with sarcasm.

Hennis nodded.

"Then you saw how bad he was. I knew I needed a new attorney the first time I met him. And I was quite sure this court had no interest in getting me one. Implying I had committed a capital crime on Silas III, and therefore dragging my mother into this was the perfect way to get decent representation."

It took every bit of will power Rey had not to slap the back of his head. Although after listening to Leia explain the court system to her the last few days, she had realized how important a good attorney was; she couldn't approve of him putting his mother's life in danger.

"On that point," Hennis said. "If you expect me to defend you, you will do exactly that. You will let me defend you. I won't stand for any of those interruptions, or grandstanding."

At the same time, Leia said under her breath, "I'm surprised you didn't decide to defend yourself."

"I'm not an idiot," Kylo Ren snarled slamming his cuffed fists against the table. Leia sat perfectly still, meeting his gaze, but Hennis startled and pulled away.

Kylo Ren leaned back again, trying to control his anger. "This may shock you, but I have a bit of a temper," he said dryly. "People fear me. I am not a - nice - man." He drew out the last few words. "I know better than to defend myself. And you should not put me on the stand. I managed to keep my temper for ten minutes because I knew how delightful it would be to watch everyone turn on her," he nodded towards his mother. "The less I speak in court, the better."

"Good," Hennis said. "I'm glad we agree on the basics. Now, I need to hear about what happened on Silas III, and are you sure you want her in here?" nodding towards Rey.

"She's fine," Kylo Ren said without thinking. "Besides I was just on Silas III as a . . . friend?" Leia snorted, but he continued. "I didn't kill anyone. . . on that planet anyway."

Kylo Ren was quick and efficient in telling what had happened on Silas III. One of the Knights of Ren, Volo Ren, was Silian. Since the Silian's were a rather distinctive insectoid species, they had realized that Volo Ren was one of their own. When news had reached the planet that he had joined the First Order, they had sent him a summons to stand trial as a traitor to the New Republic.

What Kylo Ren called an act of friendship was diverting their shuttle after another mission so Volo Ren could return to Silas III. Whatever Volo Ren had intended to do when he returned to Silas III was unclear. But evidently his family had begged him to stay and stand trial, so they could all be punished for his treason. 

According to Kylo, it was Volo who killed his family, and the rest of the village. Kylo was merely a bystander. "Volo needed to deal with his past on his own," Kylo had said. "It would have been rude of me to help."

Rey hated it, but she believed him. She could easily imagine that in his head, friendship was piloting a friend to his home planet so he could massacre his home town. 

"Are there any witnesses who can corroborate your story?" Hennis asked.

Kylo Ren only shrugged. "Other than Volo, not that I'm aware. Volo was always quite thorough. I supposed he's a witness, but I wouldn't recommend asking him to come testify. He doesn't really like courtrooms." She could almost imagine the wicked smile on Kylo Ren's face.

Why was he like this? She wondered. She knew him better than this. She knew he wasn't the one-dimensional villain he was presenting himself as. So why, she wondered, did he seem so intent on keeping up the act?  


* * *

  
**Garnik V 2 days after the crash**

"Will you just stop?" Rey said in frustration.

Considering they hadn't found a source of fresh water, they were both hoping that the lush jungle in the center of the island meant that this world had heavy rains. The rain catchers had been Kylo Ren's idea, although he had proved very bad at making any.

So she had encouraged him to cut down some trees so they could make a better shelter. Luckily a lot of the trees had long flat branches with long thin red leaves. By keeping one branch intact, and then weaving the leaves of another branch in between, she had made a basic roof.

A few layers of mulch on top, and although it wouldn't be truly waterproof, it was better than nothing if it did rain.

Everything had been going rather well until the time had come to attach the roof to the frame he had made. Every time Kylo Ren tried to tie one of the corners in place, he just seemed to destroy her weaving.

It wasn't on purpose; she knew that. He seemed like he wanted to be helpful, it just turned out that when he wasn't using a lightsaber, he was rather clumsy.

And now he looked hurt, and she felt like an ass, which was unfair because she was the one who was doing most of the work. Mostly because he kept breaking things with those big stupid fingers of his.

"Maybe," she said, taking a deep breath to calm herself. "Maybe you can just hold the roof in place with the Force while I tie it down?"

Her attempt to appease him only seemed to make him angry. "You're too short," he said. "I don't intend to have to go about on my knees all the time just because you're freakishly short."

'Is that why he hunches over all the time,' she suddenly wondered.

Did he think people didn't notice how tall he was if he hunched over? Was he that self-conscious about his height? Or was he just too used to banging his head against things? And she was fair from freakishly short, although her slight frame often gave people the impression that she was smaller than she was. Kylo Ren, on the other hand, was very tall. But was that how he thought of himself? Freakishly tall?

Regardless the solution was obvious. And needling him was kind of fun.

"If only we had a powerful Force user capable of lifting the roof and me at the same time," she teased him.

He glared at her, but suddenly she was rising in the air, as was the makeshift roof. It was a slightly odd feeling, being levitated like this. His hold on her was gentle. Nothing like when Snoke had flung her back and forth across his throne room. But thinking of the throne room, the fight with Snoke was a dangerous thing. 

Whenever she thought about it, she couldn't help but remember one moment above all others.

_Please_

She could never stop wondering what might have happened if she'd only taken his hand.

So instead, she focused on the present and building them a shelter to share.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So an interesting thing happened as I was populating the courtroom with the necessary characters. In my first image of the court, the judge and the lawyers were all males. Which made me suddenly aware of my own internal bias towards courtrooms as a male domain. But then when I was actually sitting down to describe the prosecution, it became obvious to me that she was a woman, and in fact, it fleshed out her character quite a bit in my head because she really didn't have much of a character before that, she was just generic lawyer person.  
But the defense was different. At one point, before I'd decided I wanted the whole story to be from Rey's POV, there had actually been at least one chapter that I planned to write from the defense attorney's POV. They always had an extensive backstory and character. And yet, when the moment came to actually describe them, it just didn't seem right for them to be a man somehow. I tried writing them as a woman also, but that didn't feel right either.  
Making them non-binary just made a lot of things click into place. 
> 
> Also as far as the idea of a Jedi Seal, I don't know there's any direct cannon reference to anything like that, but it was clear in the Prequal Trilogy that Jedi did sometimes guard Senator's on important missions and were sometimes guards. Some of the Senators of the Old Republic were bound to be corrupt, and it so I felt like they would have come to some sort of compromise with Jedi to make sure that their guards didn't talk about things they didn't want known.
> 
> This won't be the last time I use the idea that the Jedi had too much power, and were allowed to be basically above the law in the Old Republic, in return for protecting the status quo.


	7. Moonlight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey is reminded of the vision of Ben Solo that convinced her to surrender to Snoke.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks so much for all the Kudos. It's been a rough weekend so I decided to post another chapter to help keep me focused on keeping the story going.
> 
> Also a reminder, italics are for remembered conversations, bold is for telepathic communications.

_Your faith was strong, but you need proof,_  
You saw her bathing on the roof,  
Her beauty in the moonlight overthrew you, 

-Hallelujah, Leonard Cohen

**Garnik V, 5 days after the crash**

The rain catchers had worked. Not great at first, but as Rey had explored more and more of the out edge of the jungle, she had found a plant that had giant nuts. Not only could they eat the inner meat, but the outer shells had done a much better job of storing rainwater for them to drink than her original creations made from the broad leaves of some of the other plants.

So far it had only rained at night. Rey had mixed feelings about this. It meant she had more useful hours during the day to improve their camp but found the sound of the rain kept her awake. Obnoxiously, it didn't seem to have that effect on Kylo.

And this last night had been a particularly bad storm, one that hadn't stopped as the sun had come up.

That didn't seem to stop Kylo however. He was still convinced that he could salvage one of their ships from the ocean. She usually found other things to do while he stripped for his swim, but with the rain pouring down, she was trapped in their tall, but otherwise small shelter.

"You're not going swimming in that?" she asked.

"In a thunderstorm, of course not," he told her. Then he frowned. "Although clearly if the lightning hits the ocean, it doesn't kill all the fish. . ." He shrugged. "Never thought about that before. But no, I'm not going swimming."

"Then maybe keep your clothes on?" she pleaded.

"And miss out on the chance to be clean? A cold shower is better than none," he told her.

Showers were amazing, she had to admit. She had learned to love them since leaving Jakku. She wasn't always sure that they were more efficient than using sand to clean herself as she had done for most of her life, but they were undoubtedly more refreshing.

She wasn't sure if a rainstorm was clean or refreshing, however. She would stick to waiting until Kylo Ren was away and then using the sand from the beach to wash.

Annoyed, she looked away as he continued to strip down. The light of Garnik was blue, and this was hardly the first time she had noticed the way his skinned seemed to glow in its light like he was some sort of ethereal being. It was rather entrancing, and she did not intend to let him catch her looking at him.

But then she heard a strange sound. Startled, she looked up.

Kylo Ren stood with his hands outstretched on either side, his eyes closed, and his head flung back. 

And he was laughing.

A sharp pain ran through Rey's heart because the man who stood before her, laughing as the cold rain washed him clean wasn't Kylo Ren.

He was Ben Solo.

And Rey had spent every day since Crait convincing herself that Ben Solo was dead; that he was only a fantasy put in her head by Snoke to lure her into a trap.

Rey didn't know if she could deal with the possibility that her vision had been real.

Ben Solo is dead, she told herself. There is only Kylo Ren.  


* * *

  
"Are you sure you're okay with this? Poe asked her concerned. "Just say the word, and we'll call the whole thing off."

Rey shook her head. "It's fine."

"Because you know, uh. . . You'll, uh, need to keep an eye on him." Poe said, embarrassed.

Rey could almost laugh at the absurdity of it all. 'Keeping an eye on him,' as Poe put it, was the last thing Rey was worried about.

She was going to be alone with Kylo Ren.

Well, as alone as you could be when there were armed guards outside the door and audio recording devices inside. 

The fact that he would be taking off his clothes? It certainly wasn't going to make this any more comfortable, but it wasn't going to make her go blind or scar her for life as Poe was implying it might.

Then again, who was to say the times they had spent together naked on Garnik V hadn't scarred her for life? She certainly wasn't the same girl who had crashed on that planet.

"I told you, Poe, it's fine. Can we just get this over with?" she said wishing he'd let it be. 

He would never understand that this was something she had to do, not out of some generic sense of decency or abstract notion of Jedi kindness. She had to do this because although she wasn't prepared to put a word to how she felt about Kylo Ren, she owed him this. And she felt like an absolute jerk for not noticing the state he was in.

It was his new attorney Jaren Hennis who had approached her after their first interview with Kylo Ren. They had asked if it was true that she had captured him, and that if as a Jedi she could control him.

"You'll have to be more specific than that," she said.

"Surely you must have noticed his. . . condition?" Hennis had said. "I must say it's a tribute to your Jedi training that you could stand that near him for so long." She didn't say anything. Everyone assumed she hated being around him. "I can't believe they haven't let him bathe since he's been here."

And then Rey understood and felt foolish. One of the more embarrassing lessons she'd learned after leaving Jakku was that most of the rest of the Galaxy considered perspiration to be dirty, and spent a lot of time covering up the way bodies smelled naturally. On Jakku, sweating was basically part of getting up in the morning. No matter how clean you were, you were bound to be sweaty.

She'd hadn't realized that her habit of training and then going to the mess hall to eat, had bothered the other Resistance members until Rose had taken her aside and told her that maybe she should shower after training.

She was grateful to Rose for being honest, even as she thought she would sink into the ground and die from embarrassment. She was always worried that people thought of her as a desert rat and not as a Jedi. Then again maybe it was better to be a desert rat than the Stinky Jedi.

So she had tried to pick up the habits of those around her, trying to fit in with her new Resistance friends. And she supposed it made a kind of sense. There was a strange smell to the recycled air that flowed through their base, maybe it was the smell of too many bodies kept inside for too long.

Regardless, she wasn't as sensitive to these things as she'd learned other people were, so being able to smell Kylo Ren hadn't bothered her or seemed amiss. 

But she realized not being able to shower must have driven him crazy.

Even if it hadn't, she realized his arms and wrists had to be sore. She hadn't thought much about the binders he was wearing when she'd seen him at the trial or when he'd met with her new attorney.

But he wasn't just wearing the binders in those moments she'd learned. He had worn them every moment since they had brought him to this base. They were the only thing keeping him from using the Force, and no one was going to risk what he would do if they were taken off.

On the one hand, she couldn't blame Poe. He was right, Kylo Ren was incredibly dangerous. Without the binders, there wasn't anything to keep him from escaping, or at least killing a lot of people in an attempt to escape. 

But with his hands cuffed like that, he couldn't undress fully to take a shower. 

It wasn't meant to be cruel, and yet it was, as his new attorney had pointed out. Hennis had also pointed out that 'dressing him like Darth Vader' was likely to influence the jury, although Poe had contended that no one had dressed Kylo Ren up. Those were his own clothes.

There had been a bunch of back and forth, a lot of arguing, and when all was said and done, Rey had agreed to supervise him while he was allowed to shower. Of course, it wouldn't be just her, outside there was a small regiment of armed guards with blasters, all ready to try and take Kylo Ren down if he tried to escape.

Hopefully, it wouldn't come to that.

But as she saw him come down the hallway towards her, she began to have her doubts.

He was angry.

His face was a mask of rage, and she could see the tension in his whole body as he was brought towards her.

For a moment, she wondered if he knew what was going on, that they were trying to be more considerate. And then she realized of course he did. That's why he was so angry. This huge production was being made over his hygiene, and she couldn't help but sympathize. 

Which if he realized would probably only make things worse. 

Maybe it was a good thing the binders cut off their Force bond.

No, this wasn't going to go well at all, she thought. But it was probably best to get Kylo Ren out of sight of everyone else as quickly as possible.

So she opened the door to the fresher and stepped inside.

This wasn't a small private fresher, but a larger public one meant for use by troops stationed on the base. It had a big open area with benches and lockers for people to change, and another room with a series of showers. But it had been cleared out, and no one was there now.

Feeling a bit foolish she did a quick look around the room as if a hidden First Order rescue team was going to pop out of one of the stalls.

When she turned around, he was there, towering over her, his eyes swirling with anger, and maybe something else. Behind him, the door was stuck open as Poe, and the other armed guards were standing too close for its sensors to let it close.

She needed to get this over with. 

"I've got him," she told the others, and reluctantly they stepped away from the door.

She started to reach out to undo his binders, suddenly aware of just how close they were. She looked up at him, "Is this going to be a fight?"

He glared down at her and furrowed his brow as he struggled to make up his mind. She could almost see the internal battle as he grappled between wanting to escape, and the obvious fact that this was not a good time to do it. Not wither the entire Resistance on alert expecting him to do so.

It was Kylo Ren, so of course, there was going to be a fight. But today at least, the battle was just within himself. "No," he said at last.

She nodded, she wouldn't have believed a quick answer, but for now, at least it seemed he would bide his time.

As she removed the binders, she couldn't help but think something was wrong with his left hand. She gasped when she took them off, unsure of whether it was because of what she felt as the Force bond came rushing back, or because of what she saw.

She quickly tamped down the intense anger and pain that flowed off of Kylo Ren, even as she could feel him start to gather the Darkness around himself. Instead, she grabbed his left arm and forced the sleeve of his tunic up away from the gloved hand.

He winced slightly, but through their bond, she felt the pure intensity of his pain. With the binders on, she hadn't realized the unnatural angle at which the fingers of his left hand hung, but with them off it was clear what he had done, or tried to do anyway.

He'd attempted to break his hand and wrist to get out of the binders. No, he **had** broken his hand, it just hadn't worked. His hands were still too big compared to the slim ring of the binders. He still hadn't been able to get himself free despite breaking his own bones.

Without thought or hesitation, Rey wrapped her fingers around his wrist and called on the Light, focusing her attention on the broken bones, the torn muscle, and blood that lay under the surface of his skin.

He tried to pull back, but she wouldn't let him.

"Don't," he warned her.

She didn't listen.

Calling on the Light like this, tended to leave her thoughts a little detached, as the serenity of the Light filled her. And as such, she understood his resistance; he drew strength from the pain.

And in an odd moment of clarity, she realized they might have done more to break him by treating him well then by torturing him. It was an impossible idea, but Rey suddenly thought that if they were only nice to him, gave him a nice bed, didn't treat him like a wild animal that would break free from his cage at any moment and tear them to shreds, they might be able to reach him; to strip away Kylo Ren, and bring Ben Solo back.

But that wasn't going to happen.

On the bright side, they weren't intentionally torturing him, so at least they weren't making him stronger and more stubborn.

The moment she let go of his wrist, he moved forward, trapping her against the wall one had on either side of her head. He leaned his head close to hers, "You haven't come to see me," he said his managing to be both angry and suggestive.

** They're listening,** she told him through their newly awaked Force bond.

"I don't care," he growled.

"I do," she replied, pushing him away.

He let her, and she could feel him emotionally flinch at her words.

"They aren't going to give you much time," she told him. "The water will even be hot."

She had meant it to be an enticement, but that's not what he heard.

"Am I supposed to be grateful?" he snarled.

She couldn't blame him, not really. It would be foolish to expect him to be happy about being a prisoner.

"No, you're supposed to make do, that's all any of us can ever do," She said sadly.

Just the hint of a smile played at the corner of his lips, but his eyes almost seemed to pity her. "Now you're finally starting to sound like a Jedi."

She leaned back against the wall, crossing her arms. This was, in a sense, his time. If he wanted to waste it like this, well, that was his choice.

He took the hint and started to undress.

**Tell me,** he said through their bond, his mood softening. **Was this all your idea to see me naked again?**

**You wish,** she responded a little more playfully than she meant to. But maybe that was okay. The teasing was better than the not-quite-fighting they had been doing a minute ago.

He carefully folded his clothes and set them on the bench before moving into the shower. Once he couldn't see her, she scooped them up and took them to the hallway door where she exchanged them for the clothes his attorney had brought.

He wasn't going to like it, she knew, but that had been part of the point of all this. At least she saw the new clothes were dark grey. He couldn't throw too much a fit about that.

Well, he could, but she held out the slim hope that he wouldn't.

She kept their bond open to keep tabs on him, and over and over, she started to reach out, started to say something. More than anyone, she wanted to talk to him. After the months of closing off their bond, Garnik V had reminded her what a natural confidant he could be. 

She remembered their Force bond in the early days.

_ I've never felt so alone._

_You're not alone._

_Neither are you._

It's why when he'd chosen the First Order over her, she had to learn to shut it out. It would be too easy for her to betray everyone else.

**Do you really think I would have tried to raid your mind again?**

His words startled her out of her revery. 

**You mean like now?** She replied, annoyed, although mostly at her self for not guarding her thoughts better.

**Say it, Rey.**

**Say what?**

**Whatever it is that weighs you down. Whatever truth you are hiding from.**

**Whose starting to sound like a Jedi now?** She teased him, falling back into what had become a familiar pattern.

Part of her knew he was right. She avoided speaking unpleasant truths, even when they weren't hers.

_I didn't hate him._

_Then why?_

_Why, what? Why, what? Say it._

_Why did you... Why did you kill him?_

But part of her also thought he was wrong, not about her, but about the value in speaking about such things.

Kylo Ren seemed to want her to scream her pain to the heavens. And yes, maybe she had been able to let go a bit after she'd finally admitted out loud that her parents had sold her. But also, Rey had lost something. Rey had lost an admittedly misguided scrap of hope. 

That day in Snoke's throne room felt like the day she had truly become an unwanted orphan. The day she had become the girl that no one would ever choose.

So she held her tongue, as she had for all those days on Garnik V. Because this was a truth that wouldn't be painful until it was spoken. Then it would tear everything apart.

"If I'm the one who sounds like a Jedi," he said out loud emerging from the shower. "The Galaxy is pretty fucked, huh?"

And every thought went out of Rey's mind, as she saw how beautiful and real, he was.

He was rubbing the water out of his hair with one towel while another white one hung low about his waist. In the soft blue light of Garnik V, he had looked like a beautiful apparition, a dream that would fade if you tried to actually touch it.

But here in the harsh artificial white light of the fresher, he was all too real. The light emphasized every hard line of his muscles, and his scars stood out in sharp contrast to his otherwise pale skin. She was suddenly aware of the cool metal beneath her hands where she leaned against the wall. This wasn't a dream; this wasn't some isolated planet where they could pretend the rest of the Galaxy and all its problems were far, far away.

This was reality. 

And if she wanted she could reach out and touch him. He wouldn't vanish, wouldn't go anywhere, his flesh would be warm and solid under her fingers.

He stopped drying his hair and went still, her thoughts crossing over to him through the bond. Up until now, his own feelings thoughts had been blurred by his anger, discomfort, and humiliation. But as he picked up on her own unguarded thoughts, they drew his in a similar direction.

He looked at her through the matted mess of wet curls with a hungry look, and she was pretty sure it was not her imagination, as the towel around his waist started to twitch in response to his own growing arousal.

"No," she said firmly, trying to shut everything down, her mind, her body, her desires.

But he moved too quickly; her back was already against the wall making it easy for him to pin her there, as he bent his head to her neck and pressed himself against her, as his hands began to explore her body.

"Is everything all right?" she could hear Poe ask through the door.

"Yes! Yes, it's fine," she said in a panic, remembering that they were being listened to.

**Stop! Please, please stop!**

She was desperate, afraid she would either start crying, or start moaning in delight. She wanted this with all her being and was terrified beyond belief of being discovered.

And just like that, he stopped. He pulled back, and she saw the anguish and confusion in his eyes.

But she couldn't deal with his pain. Her relief was too overwhelming.

"You need to get dressed," she said in as neutral a tone as she could muster. "The trial will be starting again soon."

For just a moment more, he looked at her like a baby Porg that had just been kicked. Then he pulled away.

It was almost a comfort to her when he saw the clothes that had been brought for him, and he returned to a state of anger.

"No," he said firmly. "I will not wear that."

"Well, it's that or go to court naked," she told him. "They're nice robes, what's the problem?"

Technically she supposed they weren't robes at all. There was a dark grey tunic with a high collar and rather simple pants. But along with them was a metal chest piece, from which hung long dark grey velvet fabric, beautifully draped. At first, she had thought the chest piece an odd choice, but it didn't close completely under the arms, which meant that part at least he would be able to take off even with the binders on. 

It was rather practical, he wouldn't be forced to sleep in it, and it would stay wrinkle-free when he wasn't at trial, but still gave the look of formal robes.

"The style," he said.

She only looked at him slightly bemused, did he care that much about fashion? That seemed hard to believe for someone who always wore the same black clothes.

**We could escape together,** his thoughts were desperate, he knew she wouldn't say yes, yet he clung to hope.

** It's usually better to escape with pants,** was all she could think to respond, hoping that it would somehow soften the blow of her refusal.

She didn't know how he could look so small and vulnerable. Perhaps that's why he finally began dressing at the same time that he started to put up his own barriers. Now, he was the one trying to keep her out. And she wished she believed it was because he was readying himself for an escape and trying to hide his intentions from her.

Finally, he held out his wrists so she could put the binders back on.

**When the time comes, I won't let them execute me. Will you?**

**No.**

But even as the thought sprung unbidden from her mind, she closed the binders about his wrists, cutting off their bond, and she wasn't sure if he had heard her or not.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The clothes that Kylo Ren is changing into are [of this style](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bail_Organa#/media/File:Star_Wars_and_the_Power_of_Costume_July_2018_40_\(Bail_Organa's_Senate_robes_from_Episode_III\).jpg).


	8. Pride

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Finn is called on to testify, and Rey begins to understand Ben Solo's difficult relationship with his past.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for all the Kudos and comments. The little notifications all week long have made me so happy. So here's a longer chapter (actually there was just no good place to break it up.

Leia gasped as she saw her son reenter the courtroom. 

The strength of the reaction surprised Rey. It was true he looked different in the grey robes rather than in his usual black, but they looked good Rey thought.

"I can't believe Hennis did this?" Leia said angrily under her breath.

"What?" Rey asked, confused.

"Those robes. . . It's an old-style, no one wears them anymore. Not since. . . It was popular among the nobility of Alderaan."

"Oh," was all Rey could think to say.

At least now she understood why he'd been so angry about the clothes. He wasn't a fan of the past, especially anything designed to connect him to his mother.

And Rey found herself wondering about Ben's childhood, in a different way than she ever had. She had often wondered how he could reject parents that clearly loved him so much. But for the first time, Rey saw the way the past had shackled him. How he had never been entirely his own person but had always been weighed down by his family and the Galaxy's history.

"I suppose we will need to begin again with the reading of the charges?" The Judge said as everyone took their places.

"As long as they have not changed, Your Honor," Hennis stood and spoke. "That will not be necessary; my client is ready to plead."

"Counselor?" the Judge asked the Prosecutor.

"We have no changes to make to the original charges at this time."

The Judge nodded. "Then, how does the defendant plead?"

"My client, Prince Ben Solo of House Organa, pleads not guilty on all counts."

There was a slight murmur from those watching, but Rey suspected it had more to do with hearing him called a prince than any surprise that he was pleading not guilty.

Kylo Ren glared at his attorney, and Rey suspected that if he had access to the Force, he'd be choking them. But to her amazement, he said nothing.

"Very well," the Judge said. "Then the prosecution may call its first witness."

"I call Finn to the stand."

If seeing Kylo Ren dressed as a Prince of Alderaan was strange. The next hour listening to her friend's testimony was utterly surreal.

She had never asked Finn about how he left the First Order. What would she have said? "So what finally motivated you to leave an evil empire?"

And to be fair to Counselor Kappa, that's not exactly what she asked. Her questions were more precise. Asking Finn about the specific events that took place on Jakku the day the first order captured Poe Dameron. 

And Rey had never quite realized how much she had missed during the Battle on Takodana. 

But it wasn't listening to the events she wasn't part of that give the whole proceeding an air of unreality. It was listening to Finn describe Starkiller base; it was listening to him describe moment by moment the death of Han Solo, a moment forever burned in her mind. 

She remembered how they stood side by side as they watched together. And yes, it was the same scene she observed that she was hearing her friend describe, and yet it was so different hearing it from someone else's point of view.

Because Han's death wasn't the same to them. Finn admired him; was in awe of him. To Finn, Han Solo was the hero of the Rebellion, and if he liked Han in the brief time they knew each other, even so, Han was a larger than life figure. Finn had seen the death of a legend. 

But for Rey. . . 

_You feel like he's the father you never had. He would've disappointed you._

The testimony kept going. Finn was asked about more than just the events he had witnessed. As a former member of the First Order, Kappa asked him questions about the power structure. Of where Kylo Ren fit in, about how orders were given.

But even as the testimony moved on, Rey felt like she was trapped back in that moment, the moment when she watched Kylo Ren, still just a stranger to her back then, kill his own father.

_I didn't hate him._

And she wondered how she had ever become okay with this, with what he'd done. Because although she hadn't forgiven him, she didn't hate him the way Rey felt she should. What did it say about her, that even if she didn't understand, she accepted? 

No accepted wasn't the right word. 

But somehow in things she knew were true about Kylo Ren, the murder of his father has managed to move down in importance on the list.

And that seemed such a disservice to Han. To the man, Rey was sure he'd been, despite the brief time she'd known him.

And she remembered the first moments when they met. Han's pride in correcting her about the Kessel run. And remembering that look of pride on his face, it made her think of Kylo and that stupid fish.  


* * *

  
**Gavin V 12 days after the crash**

Rey hated to admit it, but she was angry. She thought Kylo had finally given up on his crazy plan of trying to swim to their wreckage. Not that his hunting expedition had gone any better, but at least he'd been trying to be useful.

She knew he had a hard time understanding why she wasn't desperately trying to get them off this planet. She wanted hopelessly to leave, but she couldn't do it again. She couldn't count the days until her friends come back for her. She couldn't stare up at the sky waiting for someone who might never come.

Not again.

Because although she believed her friends were out there searching for her, she couldn't hold onto that hope, because if she did, it would take her over. 

You could waste a lifetime waiting for someone to come back.

Or you could try and live the life you'd been given, as small and desperate as it might be.

So she spent her time trying to push them from the edge of survival to an existence that might be considered comfortable. She'd done it on Jakku. She could do it here.

But not Kylo Ren. It seemed he wouldn't be satisfied until he'd drowned himself.

Which is why she was surprised when she heard him call her name, early in the day. Too early for him to have gone far from shore.

"Rey, look!" He called to her.

His skin was no longer uniform in color. Garnik's blue light might have felt softer to their eyes, but was just as harsh on their skin, and the top of his shoulders and arms had burned from his long days in the ocean. It had made him miserable to be around while the skin was pealing.

But for once she was less aware of his nakedness than the large black flapping creature he had on the end of a stick.

"What is that?" she asked aghast.

"A fish," he said grinning broadly. Then he furrowed his brows in thought, "Have you ever seen a fish before?"

"Of course I've seen a fish," she said defensively.

Although she'd never really gotten a good look at one. She just had a vague memory of Luke spearing them on Ahch-to.

"Well, now we have something to eat," he said proudly.

"We have food," she said defensively, crossing her arms. She thought she'd done quite a good job keeping them fed. If he was hungry, well maybe he shouldn't go out swimming all day and wearing himself out.

"Yes," he snarled. "Food that you've found because only you know how to do anything right."

"You haven't exactly been trying to help," she snapped back.

"I've done nothing but try to help! But everything I do is wrong. Every time I try to do anything, you yell at me for being a big oaf!"

"I've never said that," she said defensively.

"But you've thought it. Loudly!" 

That made her blush with shame. Maybe she had thought it, but she hadn't meant anything by it. If anything, it had endeared him to her slightly. He was usually so self-assured; after all, he was an ace pilot, a trained Force-user, and a magnificent fighter.

Also Supreme Leader of the Galaxy.

And the son of two of the Galaxy's greatest heroes.

So maybe the fact that he wasn't just instantly good at everything was a comfort to her.

And how were you supposed to apologize for stray thoughts? 

She wanted to yell at him for listening to her thoughts, but she knew that was unfair. He wasn't digging through her mind the way he once had on Starkiller Base. The Force bond that could allow them to touch across star systems took on a different shape when they were together like this. When it sprang to life now, they each had to work to guard their thoughts from each other.

Whenever the bond had woken up, he had instantly put up his walls, to keep her out. She had not been as careful. After all, she wasn't currently worrying about any Resistance secrets or other things that needed to be hidden from him. Mostly she was just concerned with surviving, so she hadn't thought there was anything dangerous in her thoughts.

Clearly, she had been wrong.

And now she had to make it up to him.

A verbal apology didn't seem sufficient since it was her thoughts that had hurt him.

Without thinking through the full consequences of touching him, she took his hand. The bond sprang to life and took him by surprise. And before he could lock down his mind, she saw an image clearly.

It was how he saw himself, and it took every bit of will Rey had not to laugh.

His own image of himself was almost a caricature. All of his features were impossibly large and oversized. In his mind's eye, his ears stuck out too far, and he could never get his hair to sufficiently cover them. His nose was too big, his skin too marred by freckles and moles. The only part of his face he actually liked, she was disturbed to find, was the scar she had placed there. That at least he thought gave him some dignity and distinction.

But it wasn't just an image she got from him, it was all the emotion and insecurity behind it. The awkward teenage years where he'd grown suddenly and fast; when he'd yet to gain control of new longer limbs and seemed to crash into everything. The girls he had tried to smile shyly at, who would turn away from him and laugh. Thoughts he'd accidentally overheard before he understood his powers,

_ He got the worst from both his parents._

_It's good he'll have money, he's got none of his father's charm._

And always that. Always being measured against his father, the dashing hero of the Rebellion. The scoundrel who'd stolen a Princess's heart.

Being sent away to the Jedi temple had been almost a relief, because there at least no one expected him to be charming, or handsome.

And there was more, so much more, but his walls finally came up and shut her out.

Rey was shocked. She had always had this notion about the rest of the Galaxy, about how other children had lived and grown-up. That they lived happy lives with parents that loved them, full bellies, and they never thought about hurting anyone because they had everything they could want.

But in that tiny glimpse of his childhood, she had seen both more wealth and privilege than she could ever imagine; but also cruelty. The children she had grown up with might actually stab you in the back, but only because they were starving to death and needed your salvage so they could trade for rations and survive.

The children Ben Solo had grown up with, the children of wealth and privilege, had no reason to hurt each other, and if their knives were only metaphorical, they still left scars.

She had only meant to tell him she was sorry. That she'd intended nothing by it, but she now saw how inadequate that was. She had accidentally stumbled into an emotional minefield, and the fact that he hadn't blown up worse than this was a minor miracle.

And so opened her mind to him, wanting him to be able to see himself through her eyes. Wanting him to see the beauty of his strong, proud features.

But just as his own image of himself was more than just a picture, her vision of him wasn't just a snapshot. It was all the moments and impressions he'd left on her. All the sides of him she had seen and known.

There was Kylo Ren, of course. The beautiful monster behind the mask who had thrown her completely off balance in the interrogation room when he'd first taken off his helmet. The jarring disparity between the large soulful eyes that looked up at her from his mane of curls as he crouched in the corner, and the cruelty of the situation.

Then there was malevolent god she'd seen in flashes of blue and red plasma on Starkiller Base because only a god could be so hated and so beautiful all at once.

And then there was Ben, with all his complexities. Those same eyes that begged her to see past the easy story into the painful truths of his past; that asked for understanding, but were too proud to beg for forgiveness.

And the confidant who had sat quietly and listened in a hut on Ahch-To while she described her early understandings of the Force and the visions granted to her by the Dark Side. Her fascination with the curve of his large fingers as he'd taken off his glove and reached out to touch her across a galaxy.

And most dangerous of all the man who stood there shirtless, refusing to be embarrassed when the Force connected them at an inconvenient moment. Who made her fingers itch as she wanted to know what it would feel like to trace the lines of muscle on his body.

And she couldn't fight it anymore, not with him directly in front of her, nearly naked, his wet curls clinging to the side of his face. Just like that, she was touching him, one hand moving from his chest to his shoulder as she marveled at the soft wet skin and the hard muscle underneath, while the other hand gripped the back of his neck and pulled him down into a kiss.

After a second of surprise, he pulled her against him, gripping her by the waist, so her entire body was pressed against his. She pushed her tongue into his mouth the way he had when he'd kissed her the other day and began to explore.

But he really was just too damn tall. Luckily Rey had spent most of her life climbing the fallen giants of the old Empire. So she wrapped her arms firmly around his shoulders before pulling herself up and wrapping her legs around his waist.

She felt him gasp against her mouth, and this was so much better. Now she could let their tongues battle without straining her neck. 

After a moment of hesitation, he slid his hands under her thighs to help hold her in place, and she shouldn't, but she loved the way his fingers dug into her.

So she reciprocated, she tightened her hold on the back of his head, squeezes his upper arm. She had never known arms could be so amazing, but there was something so distracting about the strength in his, she was sure he would never let her fall.

And even as she thought it they were falling together, first to his knees and then he was laying her down on the sand. She loosened the grip of her legs around his waist, and he shifted as she did until she could suddenly feel something very hard pressing against her wet center.

She moaned in surprise and delight as he ground himself against her, and it's all she needed to realize that things were very unfair. His skin was almost entirely bare so that she could touch all of it, but she needed to be touched herself. Her life on Jakku had been one of constant distrust, keeping her distance from everyone else so they couldn't take what was hers.

Now she needed all the contact that she'd been denied, she needed to be touched by someone. She needed to be touched by him. 

She pushed him back so she could wriggle out of her top, and Rey saw a look of hurt cross his face, as he thought she was trying to tell him to stop. Then he saw her pull off her tunic. His eyes fixated hungrily on her breast band, and a tremor of delicious fear ran through her. 

She wanted him to see her, and yet she was also afraid of it. She'd forgotten that this started with his insecurities, as she was filled with her own. She didn't have much to show him, not like the women who were paid to dance in the cantina on Jakku.

And so it was slowly, hesitantly, she removed her breastband. Sure that at any moment he would laugh at her or simply get up, uninterested in continuing with a desert rat like her.

But the look he gave her was anything but uninterested. It was as if he was in awe of her, and maybe also a little afraid. They locked eyes and very slowly he reached out to cup her breast as if he was worried she would bolt at any moment.

But she could never run from this, his hand cupping the underside of her breast felt so right. And as his thumb circled her hardening nipple, she gave out a short excited gasp.

And just like that, he was pressed down on top of her again, his mouth plundering hers, his thumb teasing her nipple.

Then his mouth moved lower, kissing her just below the ear, then down her neck, down her collar bone, until finally, he found the other breast, the one that was aching with a lack of attention. With just the point of his tongue, he circled her nipple. The tiny bit of contact was excruciating, and she bucked her hips so she could at least have the sensation of his hardness pressed against her.

"Fuck," he whispered, his hot breath caressing her sensitive nipple.

Although his hand tightened around her other breast, he wasn't doing nearly as much as she wanted and she looked down at him she could see his eyes closed, his head bowed slightly as if he was struggling to bring himself under control.

But she didn't want him under control, she was too afraid that if he overthought this, he would stop, Rey was half sure that if she gave herself the chance to think about this, she would stop and she didn't want to.

She didn't want to think or worry anymore. She just wanted to be, to live, to enjoy this moment and not worry about all the rest.

So she did the only thing she knew how to do, she took charge of the situation. She flipped them over, so he was on his back, and she was sitting on top of him.

It was glorious looking down on him like this, seeing the look of hunger and surprise in his eyes, and as she settled her weight, she found a spot where he seemed to fit just perfect, where his hardness rubbed exactly against the sensitive spot that was begging to be touched.

He moaned with delight, and it sent shivers through her. 

She was wet and needy, and still. . . Still wearing too much.

It was so hard to move away from him, but necessary so she could remove her pants and underwear. She did it quickly without wavering until she realized that in taking charge, it was now up to her to finish undressing him. But she was hardly going to admit that she'd never done this before.

Hoping that her nervousness wasn't apparent, her fingers moved to his belly. Just as her fingers slipped under the waistband of his underwear, his hand wrapped around her wrist.

"We don't have to do this," he said his voice deep and husky.

Panic filled her as she thought he had changed his mind. She'd gone too slow, and he didn't really want her.

_You’re nothing._

Why would he want her?

And he must have felt her doubt because suddenly he was opening himself up to her, and she could feel his desire wash over her like a wave, and it humbled her. Because yes, it was carnal and hungry. He wanted her breasts, the wetness between her legs. He wanted to know what it felt like to be squeezed by her, and with her on top of him like this, he wanted to know what it would be like to be ridden by her.

But he also wanted her. Not just her flesh, not just the only other person on this planet with him. But her.

Rey.

He wanted Rey.

And he was terrified that she would turn him down again. That if she did so, he would shatter apart into a thousand pieces.

And there, on the edges of his thoughts was his uncertainty, his insecurities still present. Rey wasn't sure he meant to share it, but she suddenly knew this was his first time as well.

She could almost laugh. She had just assumed that as Supreme Leader, he had some sort of harem or something. That he went about conquering worlds and taking the most beautiful woman in the Galaxy to his bed. 

But he hadn't. He was as new and unsure about all of this as she was, and wanted and feared it just as much as she did.

And that was all she needed.

As she peeled back his underwear, a new wave of nervousness hit her. He was so big, how was she supposed to fit him inside of her?

But her mind was made up, and the sound he made when she curled her hands around his cock decided her. Kylo Ren, Supreme Leader of the First Order and possibly the most powerful man in the Galaxy was lying nervous and needy below her and looking up at her as if she was the most beautiful woman in existence.

She positioned herself above him, feeling as the tip of his cock pressed against her entrance. He whimpered and writhed, his hands digging into the sand of the beach.

Slowly, carefully she began to lower herself onto him in slow shuddering gasps. She had never felt anything like it, the stretching as she took him bit by bit into her. There was a moment of sharp pain, but also an aching delight as he touched her where no one had ever touched her before. As she found nerve endings she never knew existed. 

Even so, as she finally finished sinking down on top of him, it was almost too much. She was achingly full of him but afraid of what would happen when she moved.

"Fuck, Rey, Please!" he begged her, and his entire body looked tense with the effort of not moving. He was waiting on her, and it looked like it would kill him.

A new flush of warmth and excitement spread through her, and she began to move, slowly at first, rising up, before descending on him again. Testing the ache and feel of him, the emptiness when he was almost entirely out of her, and the rush as she let him fill her again.

He continued to beg and moan under her, and his eyes were pools of desperate darkness that called to her. His hands came up to rest against her thighs, and she could feel the tension in them as he struggled only to rest them there, and not to grip her and move her the way he wanted.

Not that he seemed to dislike how she was moving. His hips began to rise up to meet her, and suddenly, oh so suddenly, he hit her in a place inside she never knew existed, and she cried out even louder.

"Yes, that!" was all she could manage to say, and she wasn't moving slowly anymore. She needed to feel him hit that spot over and over. She found the perfect angle that ensured that he touched her there on every stroke. Now she was moving quickly all her nervousness and insecurity gone as she fucked him wildly until the moment came when she sun seemed to explode behind her eyes.

She threw back her head and screamed something unintelligible as feeling she didn't know she was capable of careened through her body.

She panted, and her body stilled as she tried to get a hold of herself. Then the whole world turned upside down, and it took her a moment to realize that it wasn't the world but her, as Kylo had flipped them over once she had grown limp on top of him.

It only took two quick strokes before he was crying out as well, as his body convulsed and he spilled inside of her. For just a second he was massive and powerful hovering over her then he nearly collapsed on top of her.

But he caught himself and rolled himself partly to the side, and she let out a sigh as she felt his softening length leave her entirely. 

They lay like that for a while, not speaking, his hard body laying next to her, and his now wet cock lying against her thigh as they both learned how to breathe again.

Finally, she stretched, testing her body to see if it was different now that she had this pleasantly aching feeling inside of her. She threw one hand back, and it landed on something cold and slimy.

"Eww," she said as she reflexively pulled her hand back. She turned to look and realized that it was the fish, lying there in the sand, cold and forgotten.

When he realized what had disturbed her he chuckled a little, and she loved the way his chest rumbled as he did so.

"I guess you expect me to cook that thing," Rey said, wondering what one did with a fish.

"No!" he said a little too abruptly. "I'll do it. Why don't. . . From now on, why don't you leave the cooking to me?"

She shrugged. Up until now there hadn't been the much cooking to do. Mostly she had tried softening up some of the tougher plants by boiling them together.

"If you want," she said, then she considered his tone. "Wait, is there something wrong with my cooking? Everything I've made has been perfectly edible."

"Yes," he agreed solemnly. "It has been. . . Edible."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So for those of you who have been waiting eagerly for the trial, the next chapter will have actual cross-examination and much more dialogue from the trial. I feel like any reader is going to come with the story with a clear understanding of the case against Kylo Ren, it's his defense that is more interesting, so I wasn't going to just rehash the events you saw in the movies.


	9. Sustenance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Finn is cross-examined. On Garnik V Kylo Ren takes over cooking from Rey.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There doesn't seem to be a definite answer as to whether Jakku and Takodonna are actually part of the New Republic or not. I feel the intent in the movies is that both these worlds are at the very least on the edges of New Republic space. I've taken that to mean they are independent worlds.

"I'd just like to start by saying what a remarkable young man you are," Hennis said as they stood to begin their cross-examination of Finn. 

"I can't begin to imagine what it must have taken to make the choice to leave the first order as you did. 

"You've told us a lot about the First Order hierarchy, but I'm a little curious about procedure. Before your mission to Jakku were you given any sort of briefing?"

"Of course," Finn replied. He looked a little overwhelmed by Hennis' friendly demeanor. He'd clearly expected the cross-examination to be more adversarial. 

"And in that mission briefing, how was Jakku described?"

"A desert planet with harsh but habitable terrain. Sparsely populated, previously held by the Imperial Remnant, but now nominally controlled by the Hutt Cartell."

"The Hutts?" Hennis asked. "So not a New Republic world?"

"Well the Empire claimed it, but I think. . ." Finn shrugged. "Sorry I don't know much about how the New Republic was formed. My understanding was after the Battle of Jakku the Hutts took over."

Hennis went over to the large screen that had been set up for the presentation of evidence. And brought up a document that seemed to be a long list. Rey couldn't really read it from where she was, but she supposed the Jury could. 

"Let the record show that Jakku was not included in the list of planets of The New Republic charter." They turned back to Finn. "And what was your mission on Jakku?"

"To find the Resistance Fighter Poe Dameron and to retrieve a map he was believed to have."

"And how did Commander Dameron get to Jakku?"

Finn looked a little confused for a moment. "His X-Wing?"

"Are you sure about that?" Hennis clarified.

"Yeah. Yes." Finn added firmly. "I remember some of the other Stormtroopers there being ordered to destroy his ship."

"An X-Wing is a military fighter, isn't it?"

"Yeah?" Finn seemed surprised by the questions.

"Now, can you tell me when the first shot was fired at Tuanul?" Hennis asked.

"As soon as we hit the ground I think," Finn said. 

"You think?"

"No, I'm sure. We were under fire, so protocol would be to start shooting back right away."

"Under fire? You mean that the resident's of Tuanul starts firing on the First Order before you landed?"

"Well, I. . ? I couldn't see, not inside the transport, but I could hear blast fire before we landed, and we didn't have a TIE fighter escort. Yes, they fired on us first." If Finn started out unsure, by the end, his words were confident.

"So you, your fellow Stomrtroppers, and Kylo Ren as part of the military of the First Order were sent to Jakku as part of a military operation to apprehend an enemy soldier believed to have important information for the war effort. Before you could land and ask for him to be handed over, you were attacked by the local populace. And this all transpired on a Neutral planet that is neither part of the First Order or the New Republic. Is that correct?"

"I suppose" Finn was forced to agree.

"Is some part of what I said inaccurate?" Hennis asked.

"No, no it's accurate, it's just. . . They surrendered," Finn said. "We didn't need to kill them."

"Right away? Did they surrender before there were any First Order casualties?"

Finn's face fell, and Rey could practically feel her friend's pain from where she sat and watched.

"There were casualties," he said quietly.

"Your Honor," Hennis turned their attention from Finn to the Judge. "I ask the charges of murder on the planet Jakku be dropped on the grounds that this was a military operation that happened outside of New Republic territory."

"Objection, your Honor," Kappa stood up. "An entire village was massacred. Does it matter where it happened?"

"It matters a great deal," Hennis said. "I think we all know that many crimes happen in Hutt space, but the New Republic has always acknowledged that those crimes are happening beyond its borders, and has no jurisdiction to prosecute them. To begin to do so now threatens to drag the Hutts into a conflict with the New Republic, and that I think is far beyond the purview of this court. In addition, I've checked on any crime reports from Jakku for the period in question, and the only one I found was the theft of a Corellian light freighter."

"It doesn't matter if the Jakku authorities report it," Kappa argued. "We have someone reporting the crime right here in front of us."

"My point was not to question if something happened on Jakku," Hennis replied. "Only to point out that my client would need to be tried by the authorities on Jakku for any such crime, and the proper course of action would be for Finn here to report the crime to them."

"You know very well he can't do that," Kappa argued. "He helped steal that freighter."

"Objection, Your Honor," Hennis said to everyone's surprise. "The witness, Finn, is not a trial here, nor has he been arrested, or convicted of any crimes on Jakku. I'd like the Prosecution's accusation stricken from the record."

Kappa looked at Hennis in surprise.

Hennis shrugged. "I've been a defense attorney for 20 years. Objecting to unfounded accusations is second nature. However, I suppose Mr. Finn is not my client. So I am willing to withdraw my objection."

"Enough!" The Judge said. "As much as I hate to say it, the defense is right. This court has no jurisdiction over crimes committed on Jakku against people who are not New Republic citizens. The charge is dropped, and we will also strike the Prosecution's comments from the record."

"I don't understand," Rey whispered to Leia. "Are they stopping the trial?"

"No," Leia whispered back. "But the last thing we need to to get the Hutt's into this conflict. They take the prosecution of crimes committed in Hutt space very seriously, considering that all they do is commit crimes. Unfortunately, some of the worst New Republic citizens go to Hutt space precisely to take part in activities that are unlawful in the New Republic. The Senate has never had the guts to stop the Hutt cartels, only to curtail activities that happen within the New Republic proper."

Leia's voice was frustrated, but Rey sensed something else that surprised her. A deep and cold hatred that Rey would not have thought the woman capable of feeling.

But before Rey could ask more about it, the Judge was banging his gavel to silence the crowd. She wasn't the only one who said something at that moment.

Finn's questioning began again.

"You traveled with Han Solo to Starkiller Base, is that correct?" Hennis asked.

"Yes."

"And what was the purpose of that trip?"

"I wouldn't call it a trip."

"Then what would you call it?"

"A mission. We went there to help destroy Starkiller Base, and also to save Rey."

"A mission, a military mission?" Hennis asked.

"Yeah," Finn said. "I mean Han and Chewie didn't really feel like a military unit, but. . . Well, we were infiltrating the base to allow the bombers and X-Wings to attack, so I guess it doesn't get any more military than that."

"So your purpose was to destroy Starkiller Base?"

"I mean, I was mostly there to find Rey, but yeah, that how I got there."

"But Han Solo was there to help destroy the base?" Hennis pestered Finn.

"Sure. I mean he really liked Rey. They kind of bonded, but yeah, I guess to be fair. . . I mean he was Han Solo for crying out loud. He helped destroy two Death Stars, of course, he was there to destroy Starkiller."

"Did General Solo tell you that?" Hennis asked. "That he helped destroy two Death Stars?"

Before Finn could answer, Kappa spoke up. "Objection your Honor, relevance?"

"I'm only trying to establish that it was likely that any member of the First Order would know about Han Solo's past," Hennis explained.

"Overruled." The Judge said.

Finn hesitated before realizing he was now supposed to answer the questions. "No, Captain Solo never mentioned it to me personally. I knew all of that before I met him, I mean, who doesn't know about the Battles of Yavin and Endor?"

Hennis nodded, then he picked up his holopad. "In your previous testimony, you said, 'Han yelled something out, I thought it was Ren, but I think now that he was calling out Ben' Does that sound correct?"

Finn nodded. "Yeah, I didn't know that was Kylo Ren's real name, or that Han was his father, but I'm sure of it now. He called out Ben."

"So he was trying to get Kylo Ren, or rather Ben Solo's attention?"

"Yeah."

"And it worked? I believe you said that 'When I saw them, Kylo Ren was meeting Han Solo half-way across a bridge.'"

"That's right," Finn confirmed.

"How narrow was the bridge?" Hennis asked.

"Uh I'm not sure," Finn said honestly.

"Was it narrow enough that if one man stood on it, he could block the path of another man?" Hennis asked.

"Yeah, I suppose it was only wide enough for one person to pass safely."

"Suppose?" Hennis asked. "If Kylo Ren had wanted to walk around Han Solo to ignore him, would he have been able to do so without pushing the other man off the bridge?"

"He didn't push him," Finn argued.

"I didn't say he did. But could Kylo Ren have simply walked around Han Solo, or was Han Solo an obstacle? Was Han Solo's presence stopping Kylo Ren from being able to cross the bridge in either direction?"

"Uh. . . Yeah, I guess that's true."

"Was it part of Kylo Ren's duties to protect Starkiller base?" Hennis asked.

"I'm not really sure exactly what his duties were," Finn said. "Way above my pay grade."

"Let me rephrase," Hennis said politely. "Was it the duty of any member of the First Order to stop the Resistance from destroying any First Order military property including its most prized weapon."

"I mean yeah, of course." Finn was starting to shift uncomfortably in his seat.

"At the point where the two men met on the bridge, was the First Order aware that the Resistance was attacking Starkiller?"

"Sure we'd already brought down some of the shields. And our, the Resistance that is," Finn clarified, "Fighters and bombers were attacking. So they had to know something was up."

"So Kylo Ren was looking for Resistance members who were attacking the base that it was his duty to protect. Then he heard Han Solo, a man infamous, even among the rank and file of the First Order for destroying two Death Stars. Since the bridge was so narrow, does it not seem a fair assumption that any other Resistance members would be on the same side of the bridge that Han Solo came from?"

"Objection," Kappa called out. "Calls for the witness to speculate."

"Withdrawn," Hennis said before questioning Finn again. "Would you agree that Kylo Ren and Han Solo were on opposite sides of this war."

"Of course," Finn said.

"But you also said before that there was no immediate confrontation, that the two men talked, but you couldn't hear what they said. Correct?"

"Yeah, that's right."

"They were two soldiers on opposite sides of a war, but also Father and Son, correct?"

"Uh, yeah," Finn said. "I mean, I didn't know that then, but yeah."

"Did it seem unusual that they stopped and talked? Back before you knew they were related?"

"Yeah, Kylo Ren's not exactly a talker. I assumed he'd just cut down General Solo then and there."

"Because that was his duty? To kill any Resistance member who was infiltrating and attacking the base?"

Finn hesitated. "Yeah, it was his duty," he finally admitted.

"This wasn't cold-blooded murder. This was a battle between the Resistance and the First Order. Two enemy soldiers met on the battlefield, and only one survived. It seems horrible because Han Solo was a great man, a hero to so many of us, and we all feel his loss. But he was also a soldier, and soldiers die in battle all the time. That doesn't make it murder."

"Objection," Kappa rose again. "Is there a question in there?"

"Sustained," the Judge said.

"You're right," Hennis agreed. "That wasn't a question. Your Honor, I'd like to move that the charges of the murder of Han Solo be against my client be withdrawn. This was a battle, not murder."

"Counselor," the Judge said. "I am not going to drop every charge brought against your client just because there is a war. The people on Jakku may not have been citizens of the New Republic, but Han Solo was one of its most well-known citizens."

"Does that matter, Your Honor?" Hennis asked. "Do the courts have different standards for famous citizens? Do we not care about-"

The Judge slammed down his gavel violently. "Careful counselor, I will not have you questioning the honor of this court."

"Understood, Your Honor. I suppose we'll move on then. Tell me, Mr. Finn, are you aware of whether Takodona is a New Republic world or not?"  


* * *

**Garnik V 13 days after the crash**

Rey looked curiously at the food Kylo handed her. He had caught fish again, which she admitted made her happy. She hadn't realized until the night before just how protein starved they'd become. It seemed that none of the plants she'd found for them to eat had much protein in them. It had kept them sustained, but the fish from the night before had given her new energy. She hadn't realized how run down she'd become.

But then this was hardly the first time in her life she hadn't had proper nutrition. The difference she supposed was that she was used to thinking of food as having everything she needed in it. The ration packs on Jakku and the ready to eat meals the Resistance had were all designed to be balanced in terms of nutrition so you could eat them long term without suffering any deficiencies. 

Yesterday they hadn't wasted much time before cooking and eating the fish. Today he had fussed over it. She had shown him the trick she used to test out the local plants using the Force, to determine if they were likely to be poison or not. She could sort of feel, how their place in the Force fit with theirs and tell if the reaction would be harmful or not.

He had actually gone and done some foraging himself at that point, although all he'd come back with were a few small red leaves. She'd never even thought twice about the plant, although she'd noticed it. The leaves were too small. It would be too much effort to make a meal out of them, but he came back with a handful and then proceeded to cut them up into even smaller pieces.

He'd also taken some of what she'd foraged to her annoyance, although she had told him he could be in charge of the cooking. One of their main staples had been a large nut, almost the size of her head. The shells were hard, but luckily if you sliced them open with a lightsaber, you could easily get the meat out. At least once you let it cool down, since the plasma tended to instantly boil most of the liquid inside the nut. It managed to also leave a good portion of the nutmeat burnt.

Instead, he cracked one open using a combination of some rocks, and the Force for added strength. Her first thought had been this was silly, but then she realized he was trying to preserve the moisture inside the nut, and she suddenly felt foolish for never trying this. It was some sort of natural oil, and although she didn't have anything mechanical that needed oiling at the moment, she realized she'd been wasting a valuable resource.

She'd found she was slightly fascinated by what he was doing. Unlike the day before where it had been a simple matter of fish and fire, today he seemed to be going through almost a ritual. Also, he had asked to borrow her knife (and to think of the times that Poe had teased her for brining her scavenging kit with her on missions) so there was less she could do than usual.

He cut today's catch into what seemed to be almost perfectly even sections, along with one of the smaller fruits on the island which he cut into wedges.

When the time came to actually cook, he levitated a sizeable flat stone he'd found over the fire for what seemed to her like a long time without actually putting anything on it. Finally, he poured some of the oil on the stone, which annoyed her as she'd thought he was actually saving it for something useful. He did try to keep as much of the oil from running off into the fire as he could by slowly tilting the stone in a circle to keep it always running from one edge to another.

She began to wonder if this was some sort of meditation technique or if he had decided to combine his chores with training as some sort of efficiency, although she wasn't sure what the point of that was. They had plenty of time and little to do on this island.

He added the chunks of fish to his cooking stone, and she saw him also sprinkle the leaves he'd cut up on top of the fish, as well as squeezing out the wedges of fruit to drizzle the juice on top of the fish.

All in all, it seemed both exhausting and wasteful as he discarded the fruit wedges once they had no more juice.

But Rey had agreed to let him cook, and he was trying to be useful, and not in her way, so she kept her mouth shut.

But now that he served her a few pieces of the fish, she wasn't sure. They looked odd with the little flecks of red leaves on top, and he was staring at her reaction, while also trying to hide the fact he was looking at her.

He sighed and began to eat his own food.

Which made her feel a little guilty. She hoped he didn't think she thought he was trying to poison her. She quickly took a bite and was surprised by the result. As far as she could tell, it was the same kind of fish from yesterday, but its taste was very different. She wasn't sure how to describe it, she didn't have a lot of words for the way food tasted beyond the basics, so Rey just quickly chewed and swallowed it as she always did.

"You don't like it?" he asked, misreading her look of surprise. His voice sounded hurt.

"It's fine," she told him. There was nothing wrong with it, after all. It was just different.

"But you don't like it," he repeated.

"I didn't say that," she said annoyed he was putting words in her mouth. To prove her point, she quickly took another bite and swallowed.

"But you're not even taking time to taste it! Just . . . . I want to know if you like it or not." He said, clearly frustrated.

She looked at him, confused. "Why does it matter?" she asked. "It's food." She was about to take another bite when he actually had the nerve to freeze her hand with the Force. She was half tempted to knock him on his ass, but it seemed the look she gave him was enough for him to let her go.

"It matters," he said slowly through gritted teeth. "Because if you don't like it, I can cook it differently tomorrow. Even Jedi are allowed to enjoy food."

"I always enjoy food," she said.

His fist slammed down into the ground next to him, and she could see him struggling with his anger as the veins in his neck stood out. She couldn't understand for the life of her why he was so angry.

"Please," he finally said after a few deep breaths. "Just take a bite, let it sit on your tongue for a minute before you wolf it down and then tell me how it tastes."

It seemed to really matter to him, and it was really a very little thing he was asking, so she did as she asked. This time when she took a bite, she let it sit on her tongue. She was surprised at what happened, the fish almost seemed to fall apart without her even chewing. And she realized now there wasn't just one taste, but several. Mostly there was something kind of bitter, but not in a bad way; it actually felt kind of good on her tongue. There was another taste too that she didn't have a name for, but she found she liked it.

She smiled a little, then chewed and swallowed.

He saw her smile, and the tension drained from his body.

"It's good," she said once she swallowed. She thought about it for a minute. She never knew food could be so light but also filling. Or have that much taste to it and be okay.

He nodded. "I think I used too much. . . Let's call it lemon. It's not too tangy, is it?"

"I don't know what that is," she admitted. "And really it's fine, it's better than fine. It's probably the best thing I've ever eaten."

Oddly that didn't seem to make him happy despite his obsession with how the food tasted.

"I'm starting to think that's not a very high bar," he said as if he had resigned himself to a terrible fate. "You've never had a real meal have you?"

She frowned at him, "Do I look like I've starved to death?"

He shook his head. "Food and a meal are not the same things," he told her. "A meal is prepared with great care, it's something you share. It's not meant to only sustain you physically."

The word share caught her attention. 

"And who do you share your meals with?" she asked.

He shifted uncomfortably. "No one. That's not. . . That's not what I meant."

She actually thought that was precisely what he meant.

"It doesn't matter," he said. "I promise when we got off this planet. . . I'll make sure you have a real meal." He sighed. "There's only so much I can do here after all."

For a few minutes, that was it. They ate in silence, although Rey was tempted to push further. To try and unpack and find out why this was all such a big deal to him. She knew how important food was, but it meant something to him that she didn't understand. Especially considering she was pretty sure he had never known starvation the way she had.

"Will you do something for me?" he asked finally.

"Maybe?" she said cautiously.

"Take one more bite, savor it, and remember it. Tomorrow, tell me if you like the meal more or less."

It was such a strange request, but she saw no harm in it. Well, no harm until she invariably said the wrong thing tomorrow and Kylo Ren got angry at her.

But she did it anyway.

They finished the rest of the meal in silence.

It wasn't until after they had cleaned up for the night that he spoke again, "It seems like it's going to be cold tonight. . ." He let his voice trail off, and he was looking at her expectantly.

"It seems the same as always," she said. It didn't seem like it was going to rain tonight, so it should be fine. And if it wasn't, well there was only so much they could do about it other than suffer through the night.

"Right," he said. Sounding disappointed. "I guess you're right."

And she wondered what she'd done wrong this time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So last weekend I rewatched The Force Awakens to make sure I was getting details correct. As I was revising Finn's testimony around the Stormtrooper he watched die, it sturred a lot of old memories. I ended up writing a companion piece that talks about this part from Finn's point of view because it didn't belong in this story but I need to work through it. If you're interested you can find [Running Into You](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20805206) here.
> 
> Also, I feel like I should point out that in our world, killing the villagers of Tuanul would absolutely be a war crime. But that's only true because we have the United Nations and the Hauge, and even then people are rarely tried for these sorts of crimes. Those are also very recent developments in human history. For most of civilization, no one thought about punishing these sorts of things.
> 
> In the book Bloodline, Leia implies that people who had been part of the Empire were accepted back into regular society. There's no indication that there were any trials. After all, Vader and Palpatine were dead, and the die-hards had fled into self-imposed exile (to rebuild and create The First Order). So I don't think they ever really dealt with what people did under The Empire.
> 
> On the other hand, I do think everything that happened at Starkiller base does fall under the category of military battle. Kylo Ren certainly killed Han Solo, but if he's tried for murder, then what about everyone else who died at Starkiller? I'm not going to make all my arguments here, I'll save it for the story, but I am curious as to what other people think.


	10. Indiffernce

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The trial continues, while Kylo Ren teaches Rey how to stay warm.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks as always for all the Kudos and the comments.

Trials, Rey learned, could be very boring. And the parts that weren’t boring could be quite unpleasant. Poe’s description of the torture he underwent at the hands of the First Order wasn’t boring, but Rey would have happily never heard it. Or maybe she would have been fine hearing it in a different setting. Some quiet night with her friends when they let their guard down and talked about the scars this war was leaving on them.

But there was something terrible about listening to her friend recount his pain for the Galaxy to see.

Rey also wondered if she hated hearing it because of what it revealed about the man she had been sleeping with not that long ago. Not that she hadn’t known in broad strokes what had happened, but she felt a bit like a traitor for ever being kind to Kylo Ren after what he had done to Poe.

And yet she didn’t know what good could come of holding an eternal grudge against him. 

Then came Hennis’ cross-examination.

It was only a mild comfort when Hennis’ turn came, and they got Poe to admit that physical torture he endured was actually at the hands of other members of the First Order. Kylo Ren only came in at the end of it to rip the map from Poe’s mind. In some ways, he ended Poe’s torture.

That’s how Hennis made it sound, and it was awful. Because Rey knew that it didn’t really matter that Kylo Ren wasn’t the one standing with blunt implements in his hand, he was a part of it, and she knew that sort of mental intrusion could be brutal, probably more so if you weren’t capable of pushing back as she had been.

It also left her with an uncomfortable question. Why wasn’t she tortured like that? Why was she given a chance to simply surrender the map?

Most of Poe’s testimony, however, was not so personal. 

Hennis first questioned him as a pilot. How long in hyperspace between Takodonna and Starkiller base? Could Kylo Ren have given the order for the destruction of the Hosnian system considering it had been destroyed moments before the attack on Takodonna had begun?

Poe argued that the order could easily have been given before Kylo Ren left for Takodonna, but it was clear that Kylo Ren was not at Starkiller base when the weapon was fired. It wasn’t proof he wasn’t involved, but it left some room for doubt.

Poe was also asked a lot about the battles that happened in the months when Kylo Ren was actively in command as Supreme Leader. He was asked to give casualty reports.

Hennis’ response was to confirm whether the targets were military or civilian. Poe knew how many Resistance members were killed, what about First Order troops? How many Stormtroopers died? He pushed Poe into a corner until Poe blurted out, “It’s a war, of course, people die.”

That seems to satisfy Hennis.

But it also made Rey wonder again if this trial was in the Resistance’s best interests. Supreme Leader Kylo Ren carried out several attacks against Resistance targets. But he always seemed to be focused on the leaders of the Resistance. All of the attacks had been actual Resistance targets.

But since they crashed on Garnik V and Hux took over. . .

Civilian casualties have gone way up. Hux had attacked several places where it was just rumored there might be Resistance supporters, as well as planets that had considered helping the Resistance whether they had or not. He seemed determined to make everyone in the Galaxy too afraid to even think of lending the Resistance any aid.

But she supposed at this point it didn’t really matter. Here they were, and wondering if letting Kylo Ren loose to try and take back power in the First Order was a good idea or not was a moot point. It was never going to happen anyway.

Lots of evidence was submitted for the court. Reports were read out, describing battles, in some cases punctuated by holos of the skirmishes whenever they existed. They showed what Rey already knew. Kylo Ren was a terrifying foe to meet in battle.

But they were battles. And she had to admit that Hennis had a point. Kylo Ren was on the wrong side of this war, but it was a war. 

It didn’t justify everything he’d done. She thought of the massacre at Taunal. Those people hadn’t wanted to be part of this war. Yet she was beginning to see the hypocrisy in calling the people Kylo Ren killed murder victims, but not caring about the Stormtroopers the Resistance killed. After all, how many other Finns were out there? There were people in that white armor. The First Order may have thought of them as cannon fodder; shouldn’t the Resistance be better?

The next day, they got to Silas III, and things get horrifically interesting again.

They’d been at the trial for days now, and it seemed it was long enough for Kappa to have gotten her hands on a lot of security footage from Silas III.

Rey had been in the room when Kylo had described what had happened to his lawyer, but she wasn’t ready to see it. In a strange echo of reality, there was another courtroom on the holos that Kappa enters into evidence. It was the court that was meant to try Volo Ren, and that had already begun to try his family for treason.

Rey didn’t see much of that trial. The holo simply showed Volo Ren showing up, Kylo Ren following behind. Then Volo Ren cried out that they had no right to judge him or his family, and when the other judge disagreed and told him to surrender himself, Volo Ren’s lightsaber ignited with red fire, and the killing began.

It is horrific to watch. Even though the Silians were a biologically very different race, Rey’s heart went out to them as she heard their strange clicking death screams.

The Silians wore bright colors, and so both Kylo and Volo Ren stood out in their black robes and helmets. But there was no mistaking which one was human and which one was also Silian. All you had to do was count the number of arms.

As the massacre unfolded, one thing became evident, Kylo Ren was not actively part of it. He stood by passively and watched, but he did not participate. There was even a moment where a terrified Silian tried to run right past Kylo Ren, and he simply stepped out of the way and let the sizeable sentient insect pass. Volo cursed at him, but Kylo simply said, “This is your matter, not mine.”

That was the point where Hennis interrupted the holovid. 

“Your Honor, this seems unnecessarily grotesque. If there is evidence of my client participating in these murders, by all means, let’s see it. Otherwise, I ask that the court dismiss the charges of murder against my client and his family from Silias III. His actions may be distasteful, but they are not illegal.”

“Counselor?” the Judge asked Kappa. “Do you have any evidence showing that Kylo Ren was behind any of these deaths?”

“No, Your Honor, but he was clearly present.”

“That may be,” the Judge agreed, “But witnessing a crime is not the same as committing one, and the laws of Silias III do not require anyone to stop a crime unless it is committed against a family member. As there is no evidence of any member of Ben Solo’s family being on the planet at the time of this massacre, I find I am forced to drop the charges.”

Rey was actually surprised by this. It was not the first time Hennis has tried to get some of the charges against Kylo dropped, but was only the second time they had succeeded. Usually, the Judge seemed to hate giving in.

To Rey’s surprise, Kappa didn’t protest as she had every other time a charge was supposed to be dropped. Instead, the Prosecutor simply moved on to entering her next piece of evidence, which had nothing to do with Silas III, and the matter was simply dropped.

When the court was dismissed for the day and Rey began to escort Leia away, Kappa stoped them. 

“Senator,” Kappa addressed Leia. Rey’s never heard anyone in the Resistance call Leia that before, but she’d noticed it was the title the members of the court seemed to prefer. Evidently, once a person had been elected to the Senate, they got to keep the title for life. “I’m glad that I won’t have to continue to prosecute you. I hope there are no hard feelings?”

But Leia’s back was straight, and she didn’t look very forgiving. “I know you are only doing your job. I don’t, however, appreciate that bit of theatre back there. You realized you didn’t have a case, you could have dropped the charges without showing that horror show.”

“Senator, I’m sorry, but that ‘horror show’ as you call it, is still emblematic of who your son is, even if he wasn’t the one doing the killing.”

For a moment, Rey expected Leia to say something sharp and biting, to put the attorney in her place. But the General had nothing to say.

“It’s not right,” Rey said without thinking. “You shouldn’t use their deaths like that. Not to go after someone who you can’t hold accountable. They were living sentient beings. They shouldn’t be used like props in a show.”

Kappa was surprised. “I’m sorry, Master Jedi,” she said, and for a moment, she sounded generally repentant. “Perhaps you could give me more guidance when we go over your testimony?”

Rey suddenly regretted speaking. She’d been dodging this woman. She wasn’t sure why, but she was afraid of testifying. The trial seems to be all about trapping people, making them say things they didn’t want to say, and Rey didn’t really know what that would mean for her.

“I’m very busy with my duties as the General’s bodyguard,” Rey said automatically.

“Yes,” Kappas doesn’t sound convinced. “So you’ve said. Luckily Dameron has told me once we relocate to the new base, the General will no longer need a guard. So I look forward to talking to you then.”

Right, Rey reminded herself. They were moving the trial to another base. She’d let herself forget all about it.  


* * *

  
**Garnik V 13 days after the Crash**

“It seems like it’s going to be cold tonight. . .” Kylo Ren’s voice trailed off expectantly.

“It seems the same as always,” she’d said.

“Right,” he said. He sounded disappointed. “I guess you’re right.”

“What?” she demanded. “What have I done now?”

He looked surprised by her reaction. And then he gave out a nervous chuckle.

“What?!” she demanded again.

She could see him carefully, considering what to say. His walls were up so she couldn’t tell what he was thinking, at least not without trying to force her way in. And maybe she was a little tempted. But she wasn’t going to do that.

Finally, he decided to speak.

“I wanted sex, that’s all. I hoped you did too.”

Rey was immensely confused. “What does that have to with the weather?” she asks exasperated.

He shook his head. “You must be the most difficult to seduce woman in the entire Galaxy.” Before she could say anything else, he continued. “Bodies are warm. . . So if it’s cold, it’s less cold if you have another body with you.”

“How am I supposed to know that’s about sex?” she asked, annoyed. “And why. . . ?” she let her voice trail off before finishing that question. 

‘And why would you think I would have sex with you?’ was the question she had been about to ask, before realizing what a silly question to ask that was.

After all, they had already had sex.

Once.

Yesterday.

So she couldn’t pretend it was an impossible occurrence. 

She just still hadn’t figured out what she thought about the whole thing. She was all too aware that she had acted without wanting to think it through, which put her in precisely the situation she was in now.

As she struggled with her thoughts, he stepped in close to her and tilted her chin up, so she was suddenly looking into eyes which seemed darker than usual.

“Why?” he repeated her half asked question, his voice was low, dangerous, and it sent a shiver through her. “Because you consume me.” 

She’d lost track of what question he was answering, but his answer made her tingle all over. His thumb rested on her cheek, and it felt like fire.

Slowly he uncurled his fingers and moved his hand, his fingertips ghosting over her throat until he slipped his hand up and around her ear, gripping the back of her head.

Slowly, deliberately, he bent down to kiss her. This kiss was different from the others they had shared. It wasn’t frenzied or rough. Instead, he delicately pressed his lips against hers, gently breathing her in. His tongue traced her lips for a second, before it probed slowly, seeking entry into her mouth. She gave it, even as alarm bells went off in the back of her mind. Some part of her thought this was far more dangerous than the rough passion of the previous day.

She felt like she was consuming him like she was pulling his body into hers as they sank into each other. She tangled her fingers in his thick dark hair with one hand while she gripped his shoulders with the other, afraid that her legs would simply give way if she didn’t find a way to hold herself up.

He began to slowly move them back towards their shelter, refusing to break off the kisses as he did so.

He pulled her down slowly, gently, until they were both kneeling, and the soft kisses continued. He had been resting one hand on her back. Now it moved up, under the back of her tunic, and his thumb drew little circles against the small of her back, as he continued to taste her lips and tongue.

Then next time she pulled back to breathe, he let her lips go and began to kiss her just under the ear, then down slowly down her throat. He pulled back long enough to slip her tunic over her head and quickly removed her breast band, then he laid her down before beginning again from below the other ear. But this time, he continued down past her neck first to one breast then the other.

She let out little gasps of delight as he teased first one nipple then the other, but unlike the day before, she was no longer impatient with him. Instead, she felt almost like her will was gone, and she half wondered if he hadn’t done something to her with the Force to make her complacent.

But this wasn’t the Force; this was just the magic of his full soft lips. Everything about him was proud, hard, and sharp, but not those lips. Those lips were soft and round and felt better against her skin than anything ever had.

She felt him smile against her stomach and realized with a blush that she hadn’t been guarding the bond between them, and he must have picked up those thoughts. In return, she felt a wave of burning desire course back along the bond, and she wondered how he could burn so hot, and yet move so slowly.

He wanted something, wanted it so much he thought it would tear everything apart if he didn’t get it, and yet his lips were still slow and gentle against her skin. She was amazed he had this kind of restraint, and she sent the thought back towards him, meaning it as a kind of praise.

But it amused him instead.

**This isn’t restraint.**

She was surprised for a second because she could feel his mouth kissing a slow circle around her belly button, then she realized the words were in her head.

She started to prop herself up, “How-“

But he looked up and placed his thumb of her lips to silence her.

**Don’t tell me you can’t figure this out?**

She glared at him and started to open her lips to speak before changing her mind.

**Of course, I can,** she told him trying to humble him with a look.

He smirked, but instead of answering, he just gently pushed her back down. Then his hand traveled down her body, stopping briefly to cup her breast as he looked at her with absolute hunger in his eyes.

Then his hands dropped to the waistband of her pants. She lifted her hips slightly to help him, but she was quietly disappointed. She had liked his gentle kisses and soft touches. But of course, this was what he wanted, to put his cock back in her, and she wasn’t going to say no, she realized, even if she was still a bit sore from yesterday. She was careful, however, to keep those thoughts to herself, and she sensed his curiosity, and a hint of frustration when he realized she was holding something back from him.

It didn’t stop him. He took e a good look at her, naked, flat on her back, knees bent, and legs open as he knelt between them. His breath became ragged, and his eyes had dilated so much they were dark pits of desire. He licked his lips slowly, and that sent a shudder through her.

He slipped off his own tunic, and then she felt his hands slide up her thighs. She wasn’t ready for what came next. She wasn’t prepared to see his hair fall over his face like a curtain as he bent his head between her open thighs and began to taste her.

His tongue ran up and down along her slit before pressing its way inside of her.

“Ohhhh,” she gasped in surprise at the sensation as she tried to arch her back, but large, strong hands were holding her exactly where he wanted her.

His tongue pressed deeper inside her as it began to massage her, where she’d been left sore from yesterday’s frantic sex. 

And then as his tongue soothed and explored her, the bridge of his nose suddenly bumped against her most sensitive spot, and she jerked against in pleasure. His mouth moved up then, sucking her gently into his mouth then pausing to trace arcane symbols on her clit.

It was more than she could bear. More than she imagined she could feel. It was too much, overwhelming, and just when she thought she’d break apart under his tongue, he abandoned that bundle of nerves to begin tasting the juices that were now leaking out of her slit. 

She gasped, trying to find air, as she came back from the edge of something, half grateful, and half angry that he’d stopped before she could ride the feelings towards their end.

She ached for him. Even as his tongue pressed inside her again, it wasn’t enough. She wanted everything, she wanted his mouth back on her clit, and she wanted to be filled, oh how she wanted to be filled by him again. To be stretched out by his cock even if it did leave her aching and soar.

She hadn’t known this was possible, that this was something that someone could do to her. Any number of traders had made obscene passes at her over the years, calling out crude suggestions to her about what she could do with her mouth, but she didn’t know this could be done to her.

And she wanted more. She tried to move against him, to force his mouth to the place she wanted it most, but he continued to grip her with strong fingers that refused to let her have what she wanted. It was torture, but it was the sweetest torture imaginable.

Again and again, he returned to her clit, teasing her, playing with her, bringing her back to the cliff’s edge before slowing down again, pulling back and responding to his more gentle teasing. It drove her mad, it was more than she could take. She even dug her feet into his back, trying to urge him to the spot that so desperately ached for his attention, but it was no use.

He was determined not to give in to her; to make this go on for as long as possible.

“Please, Kylo, please,” she finally begged him. He had broken her at last. 

As her words hit his ears, she felt an incredible spike of desire from him as he groaned against her, and for a moment, she felt enveloped by the flame that was inside of him.

It turned out begging was all it took, because this time when his mouth found her clit, he didn’t stop. He hummed in delight as he brought her back to that cliff, and this time he lead her right over the edge.

The world exploded behind her eyes, and her hips thrust against him as he couldn’t or perhaps wouldn’t hold her still any longer as she fucked his face with absolute abandon until the waves of pleasure left her body, leaving her boneless.

Breathless, she watched as he got up to kneel between her legs. This time he really did begin to undo his pants, shoving them and his underwear roughly to his knees as his erection sprang free.

His eyes were dark pools that seemed to hold her down to the ground as he took himself in his hand. His thumb began to spread the precum around the head of his cock before he stroked himself a couple times, never letting his eyes leave hers.

Her stomach flip-flopped as she watched him. She’d never seen anything quite as beautiful as the sight of him starting to pleasure himself, all while looking at her like she was the most beautiful thing in the Galaxy.

Then he was pushing inside her, slowly spreading her open all over again. Finally, filling that empty space, he had left inside of her. 

His hands were on her hips as he began to lift her, to pull her into the position he wanted. Perhaps she should have cared that he was using her like this, but she didn’t. After what he had just done to her, she was was willing to let him have whatever he wanted.

Strength slowly came back into her limbs, and she found her self lifting her hips to meet his thrusts. Suddenly it was no longer a rhythm he was guiding but one they were sharing as he moaned a series of obscenities with each thrust.

As she began to match him, he let go and reached between them, to run his thumb along her clit. It was unexpected, and more than her over-sensitized body could take. And just like that, she had lost control again as her body shuddered and convulsed in pleasure. 

He followed her over the edge as he collapsed on top of her.

When he started to pull away, she pulled him back down and whispered, “You’re right, bodies are warm.”


	11. Anger

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The stress of survival causes Rey and Kylo to fight. The trial is relocated.

**Garnik V 23 days after the crash**

"HOW CAN YOU DO THIS AGAIN!" Kylo yelled at her.

For a moment, it looked like he was going to knock over their shelter. But he managed to think better of it just in time. Instead, his lightsaber sprang to his hand, and he slashed at the jungle, causing several of the trees to fall.

His tantrum was pulling him away from her, and she was not going to allow that. "DO WHAT?" She screamed back, following a few paces behind. "NOT HAVE A DEATH WISH?!"

"DEATH WISH?! I'M TRYING TO SAVE US." His voice started to come down from an absolute yell, but it was still angry and very loud.

Rey took a deep breath, attempting to get her own voice under control. "What do you think I'm doing?" she said, trying to force herself to be calm.

He spun around to look at her, but he wasn't screaming anymore. "Hiding!"

"Hiding from what?" she asked, exasperated.

"From the truth, from responsibility." He began to walk back towards her, extinguishing his lightsaber.

She just looked at him for a moment, her mouth agape. "Responsibility? I'm the one keeping us alive."

She regretted the words as she said them. She knew it was still a bit of a sore point. Kylo didn't like relying on her even though he'd slowly found more and more ways to be useful around their camp.

But to her surprise, that didn't anger him; instead, he looked at her almost sadly.

"Is that all you think you are responsible for? Staying alive?" he asked. "Do you still not understand your place in the Galaxy?"

He was standing over her now, but not menacingly. His hand reached out to cup her face, but she took a step back. He might not be angry anymore, but she still was.

"I thought I didn't have a place that I'm nothing?!"

For a moment, her words confused him, then slowly, they clicked into place. "That wasn't what I meant," he said weakly.

She crossed her arms over her chest. "Well, then? What did you mean?" She wasn't sure she really wanted to hear the answer.

So maybe it was good he didn't seem to have one.

She turned to leave, to put whatever little bit of distance there could be on this island between them. But she only got a few steps before she felt him grab her from behind, pulling her back against his chest and burying his face in her hair.

For a second, she wanted to be mad, to push him away, until she felt himself open up to her. He hadn't answered not because he didn't want to, he just didn't have the words.

And just like that, she was back in the throne room of the Supremacy, the air heavy with smoke and blood, sparking with the wreckage of their battle with Snoke guard.

And Kylo Ren is lost. His heart is beating in his chest, his blood is pounding in his ears, and there is no one left to fight. And without the immediate threat of battle, he is suddenly, painfully aware of the quiet of his mind, and it feels like he will float away. Like there is nothing left to tether him to anything. Snoke has been a weight pressing down on him for so long, that he can't remember a time when the Supreme Leader wasn't there.

He doesn't know who he is anymore, who he is without Snoke. And so he latches on to the one thing that he can be sure predated the Supreme Leader, the one thing that has always been there for him: destiny. Because even before he was Kylo Ren, he was Ben Solo. Son of the Rebellion, born on the day the Galactic Concordance was signed, greatness had always been his birthright.

But as sure as he is that he was always meant to rule the Galaxy, he is unsure of one thing. The girl that stands in front of him. The girl he wants more than anything else that he wanted enough to kill his master, and yet. . . Was it ever really him that wanted her.

He is haunted by the Supreme Leader's words that Snoke created the bond that Snoke manipulated him into opening up and caring for this girl for no other reason than to lure her into a trap. His heart had been exposed simply as a way to track down Skywalker and destroy the Jedi.

And yet. . . And yet Snoke is dead, and she is alive, and nothing in his entire life had felt as glorious as fighting back to back with her.

So he tries to reconcile it all. His place in the universe, his grand destiny with the scavenger that was just a means to an end, another of Snoke pawns.

He tries to keep her, to make her a part of his story.

And he fails spectacularly.

And all he could do in the wake of that failure is chase her. He chased her because even with Snoke gone, the bond remained. And Kylo Ren didn't really know how to be alone in his own mind. Too much of him was hollowed out by Snoke, and he needed something to fill that. He needed her to help him fill in the void, to make him a whole person again.

She placed her hand over the large one around her waist. She's not the girl who ran off to turn him to the light anymore, she no longer has that sort of naive hope. Nor is she quick to forgive him for the pain his words on the Supremacy caused her. 

But she thinks she understands at least a little. After all, she'd felt Snoke tear her mind apart, looking for Skywalker. She can't quite imagine what it would be like to have that presence pressing down on you every moment of every day.

Their bond was troublesome most of the time. His presence, more likely to anger or annoy her, but it never oppressed her, never strangled or smothered her the way Snoke's had him.

She leaned back against him, unable to remember now why they had been fighting.

"We were fighting," he said to her annoyance, "Because you refuse to do anything to save yourself. Because you're content to just wait here, just like you waited for your parents on Jakku."

She pulled away from him. Maybe it wasn't the bond that was annoying, perhaps it was just him. 

** Can't you just be nice for once?**

**This is important** he responded before choosing to speak. "Why won't you save yourself? Why did you never go looking for them? How can you be content to just wait out your days here?" he demanded.

He didn't understand her at all, she thought. She wanted off this planet. She wanted to be rescued. But what if they did find a comm, what if they did send a message and no one came? How could she go on after that? Right now, she could believe her friends were looking for her, that they would find her. She couldn't lose that hope.

She also didn't know how to explain that to him, and she wasn't willing to open herself up to him the way he had to her. So she challenged him instead.

"And what if we send a message and no one comes. What if we _are_ stuck here? What if this is our life?"

She could see he was angry that she was avoiding his question, but he also didn't seem to want to pick a fight, so he changed tactics. "It better not be, because if we are stuck here for the rest of our lives, we'll have to stop fucking."

"What?" she asked at the absurdity of what he'd said. "You've got it backwards don't you? This only makes sense if we don't go back to the First Order and the Resistance."

He shook his head. "I don't have an implant, do you?" he asked.

"What? I? No," she admitted blushing. How had she not thought about that? 

"Exactly," he said. "So if we stay here and we keep. . ." Evidently, he could only call it fucking once. "You're likely to get pregnant, and assuming nothing goes wrong with that, we do what? Raise a child who will never have friends? Who will never know another soul other than us, who will be doomed to a life of lonely isolation until we are both gone and they die alone? 

"Or," he continued. "Maybe we have lots of kids, and because they are the only people on this planet sooner or later they begin fucking, and next thing you know we become the progenitors of a race of incredibly powerful but inbred Force-Sensitives, who live out a miserable existence on this planet until someone else stumbles upon it, and our descendants conquer the Galaxy."

"Wow," was the only thing Rey could say to that.

And the funny thing was this crazy notion of his went more to explain what happened on the Supremacy than anything else. Suddenly she understood the profound difference between the two of them. His eyes were always on the future, on some far distant goal: ruling the Galaxy, fulfilling a destiny, fathering a new race. While she was focused on what was right in front of her: saving her friends, finding her next meal, staying alive one more day.

And yet, despite the ridiculous turn his mind had taken, he had something of a point. They couldn't just continue on the way they had been. Because she could see it suddenly and clearly. A lonely child on a desolate planet. What if they did have a child.?What if something happened to them? Her heart broke as she thought about their child left alone to survive on this planet without ever knowing anyone else.

Rey had never really thought about having a family. Family to her had always been a part of her lost past, never a new future.

And she regretted now every kiss, every touch that had happened over the last week because all she could see now was a dozen sad, lonely futures for them. Whether they were rescued or not, there was no happy ending. There was no future, and until this moment, she had had no idea how much she wanted one.

"Rey," he said, reaching for her, feeling her sadness through the bond.

"No," she told him, stepping back. "Don't, just don't. . ."  


* * *

  
There was a nervous tension in the air as people gathered at the dock.

Rey wasn't sure if there had been a specific incident or if this was just Poe being cautious, but they were moving the trial. It was true that the Resistance had begun building strength again since Crait, but they were still few in number, and Poe didn't want to risk all of them.

So he'd decided to move the trial to another planet, taking only the minimum number of people necessary to conduct the trial and to keep Kylo Ren a prisoner.

Everyone who was going was either already part of the trial, or handpicked by Poe as someone he could trust. Because of that, Rey had been told that she shouldn't need to guard Leia once the relocation was done.

She wasn't sure how she felt about that. She was learning so much from Leia, not just about how trials worked, but also more about the Jedi than she had ever known. She hadn't understood at first why she was allowed to watch the trial, but other people like Poe and Finn, who were witnesses, weren't. After all, she knew Kappa intended to call her to the stand, though Rey had avoided it so far.

But it turned out Jedi had all sorts of special legal statuses. She was trusted not to let the testimony of others affect her testimony. She wasn't sure she was deserving of that trust. Just because she could float a bunch of rocks didn't mean she was trustworthy.

The more she learned from Leia of Jedi history, the more convinced of that she became. The Old Republic had given the Jedi too much power, too many special protections. And when the New Republic had been formed, they had been only too happy to extend those same privileges to Luke Skywalker. It wasn't until later that both Leia and Luke had learned enough about how the Old Republic had fallen to feel concerned by that, and by then it was too late.

No one was interested in revisiting the mistakes of the past, and no one expected the great hero Luke Skywalker to ever abuse the privileges he'd been granted.

But it wasn't just history lessons that made Rey value her time with the General. She was just comfortable being around the other woman even when they were silent. She was going to miss acting as Leia's bodyguard.

But at the moment, Leia's safety was the least of her worries as the doors to the base opened, and Kylo Ren walked out, flanked by his guards. 

He was blindfolded.

It made sense, she had to admit. If he had any notion of where they were, there was every chance he would reveal it when the trial started again. It was after all being broadcast to the whole Galaxy. But even so, she was pretty sure the blindfold was going to make him angry. 

And an angry Kylo Ren was not easy to deal with.

To make matters worse, the Resistance didn't have a lot of ships to spare, which meant that everyone who was going to the new location was traveling aboard the same transport.

The Judge had already lectured them that no one was to say anything about the trial. This was, Rey had learned, highly unusual. It was typical for people in a trial to be kept separate, but that just wasn't possible at the moment.

And the transport was far from comfortable. It was a modified cargo shuttle that had been adapted to be a troop transport for the Resistance. A row of seats lined each wall, and there was nothing to look at other than the person sitting on the opposite wall. The only thing more uncomfortable than the seats was the silence. The trial was the only thing on anyone's mind, and the one thing none of them could talk about.

Rey managed to wait until she felt the ship enter hyperspace to get up from her seat. Leaving Kylo, blindfolded felt wrong. This part of the transport had no windows, and even if it had, hyperspace all looked pretty much the same. There would be nothing to give him a clue to their location until they returned to normal space.

"I don't think that's a good idea," one of the guards said as she reached towards the blindfold.

She saw Kylo tense. Between the binders that cut him off from the Force and the blindfold, he couldn't tell what was happening. And it hurt her to see him like this, helpless and unsure of what was occurring around him.

He pulled back slightly at the touch of her fingers against the side of his face, and that hurt even more. Somehow she thought he would know it was her, but he didn't. She slipped the blindfold off and resisted the urge to run her fingers through his hair as she did so.

Twisting the blindfold in her hands, she retreated back to her seat without saying a word.

The trip was agony. Rey knew where they were headed, and it wasn't really that far, but Poe had decided to take a long circuitous route so that if Kylo Ren figured out where they were, he wouldn't be able to guess how far they had traveled from the main Resistance base.

It had seemed a clever idea at the time, but at the moment, Rey was mostly annoyed that Poe was flying escort in his X-Wing and not here to be uncomfortable with the rest of them as the tension rose and rose.

And then it happened.

Other than the two guards who currently had charge of Kylo Ren, there were four others who would take shifts guarding him at the new location. One of them had stood up to use the 'fresher in the front of the transport. He was walking back to his seat when Kylo stretched out his legs, his big frame far too large for the uncomfortable seats, and accidentally tripped the guard.

At least she was mostly sure it was an accident. Kylo's eyes had been on her the whole time, so he probably hadn't seen the guard. Probably.

But regardless, the guards saw it as an act of aggression. The tension that had already been high shot through the roof, and suddenly there were blasters out, and Rey was afraid that something terrible was about to happen. 

She was on her feet in an instant, yelling at the guards to stop, and when one of them directly pointed his blaster, she reached out with the Force pulling the weapon into her hand. 

That was almost a mistake because it took the guards moment to realize it was her and not him who had done it.

"Sit down!" she ordered, a little surprised at the tone of command in her own voice. "I've got this," she assured them.

The guards hesitated, and before things could get any more out of control, she grabbed the binders around Kylo's wrists and hauled him to his feet. She guided Kylo Ren to the front of the transport away from everyone else, tossing the stolen blaster to Finn as she passed.

Hopefully, getting him out of sight for the moment would calm everyone down, and she realized he probably wouldn't mind a trip to the 'fresher. Putting him in a better mood wasn't a bad idea. They still had a ways to go before they were at the new base.

Her head was full of these thoughts as she let the 'fresher door close behind them and undid his binders.

So she was completely unprepared for the attack.

The moment the binders were off, the entire weight of his body shoved her back against the wall, one of his large hands covering her mouth as the Force pressed against her mind, and everything went dark.


	12. The Code

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kylo Ren tries to find a chance to escape.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So there were some very enthusiastic comments after the last chapter. Thank you again. It also meant I felt like I couldn't keep you guys waiting for what happens next, so here's another chapter. See what comments get you :)

**Garnik V 25 days after the crash**

Rey had tried to explain to Kylo that she was the last person in the Galaxy who should try to make a boat, but he had insisted that:

A) A boat was just a ship that only had to be sealed on the bottom and didn’t have to withstand leaving or entering the atmosphere.

B) It didn’t need to be a boat, just a raft. 

C) There wasn’t anything she couldn’t build if given the time and parts.

She was pretty unsure about point A. There had to be more differences between a boat and a starship than that, and she’d much rather try and build a ship, although she didn’t have the parts. Which brought her to point C, which gave her a sort of warm fuzzy feeling. It was silly, of course, there were lots of things she was sure she wouldn’t be able to build, but his confidence in her made her want to try.

And she wasn’t building the raft by herself. Kylo actually seemed to have a reasonably clear idea of what it should be, and how it should be put together. He just had no idea how she’d woven together the palm fibers of one of the plants to make the rope that held their shelter together.

It wasn’t really that hard, she’d learned to do it back on Jakku when she used to strip the insulation off of cables to get to the valuable metal in the wire. The insulation had no value in trade, but she’d learned that it could be made into a variety of useful items for her At-At.

And once she’d shown him how it was done, and corrected him a few times, he was actually quite good at it. 

It was a strange and nice feeling, working on this with him.

But even so, there was a question that kept nudging the back of her head.

“Is it really all about ruling the Galaxy?” she finally asked.

He looked at her questioningly. “Is what?”

“You’re desperation to get off this planet. The Galaxy will go on without you, you know?”

“That’s precisely what worries me, it hasn’t done a very good job on its own up to this point.” It took her a minute to realize he was trying to make a joke. When he realized it had fallen flat, he continued. “But no, it’s not just about that.”

For a few minutes, he didn’t say anything, just twisted the palm leaves between his hands, but she could see he was considering how to respond. This was one of the most surprising things she had learned about him. So often he was rash, moving, speaking, doing without thought. But he could also be quiet, contemplative. Far more went on behind those golden-brown eyes than was at first apparent.

“The longer we stay here,” he said at last. “The more of myself I lose. The weaker I grow.”

She frowned, his words made no sense. He didn’t feel like he was becoming any weaker across their bond, or any less him. She didn’t even know what that meant.

“You’re not losing yourself. If anything you’re just less angry all the time. . .”

And as soon as she said the words she understood. To Kylo Ren, losing his anger was the same as losing himself. Which she thought was colossally dumb. She was beginning to reevaluate her belief that he had a more thoughtful, deeper side.

“You aren’t your anger,” she said forcefully.

He shook his head, careful not to look at her. “I need it, and here, with you, it is draining away.”

A shiver of warmth went through her at his words. That almost made the idea of being stranded on this planet forever seem worth it. Except that since their fight the other day, he hadn’t touched her. She wasn’t sure if he was actually worried about her getting pregnant, or if he was just trying to make some sort of point. Either way, she realized just how quickly she’d gotten used to being touched by him.

Something mischievous took hold of her then. She reached over and flicked him on the forehead. 

He nearly dropped what he was doing at looked at her in surprise. 

She flicked his forehead again.

“What. . ? What are you doing?” he asked.

She reached over to flick him again, but he caught her wrist.

“Making you angry?” she said. “I mean, that’s what you want, right? To be angry all the time?”

“That’s not . . .” He rolled his eyes at her. “You don’t understand.”

“Okay then,” she reached over with her free hand and flicked him again. He grabbed her other wrist glaring at her in annoyance. “Explain it to me.”

“This is not a joke,” he told her, pushing her away as he let go over her wrists. “Leave it be.”

She considering doing that for all of half a second. Then she flicked him again because she couldn’t help herself.

And this time, when he tried to grab her wrist, she didn’t let him. She twisted away from him, and he was forced to reach across her body, which only makes it easier for her to flick the other side of his forehead with her other hand.

He let out something like a growl even as she began to laugh, and suddenly they were wrestling, or something like it, while he tried to grab her wrists, and she tried to twist and pull away from him. They struggled until he ended up on top of her, her hands pinned above her head. She stopped fighting not because he had won, but because his face was hovering just above hers, and his breath on her cheek sent a shiver down her spine. She stopped fighting because, for once, she was happy to lose.

His mouth dropped to her ear. “Peace is a lie. There is only Passion,” he says, his voice heavy, and then he kissed her jaw just below her ear. 

Her eyes fluttered closed at the feel of his lips, and his words initiate something hungry inside of her.

“Through Passion, I gain Strength,” he shifted, kissing one of her eyelids. 

“Through Strength, I gain Power.” His breath tickled her, and he kissed the other eyelid.

“Through Power, I gain Victory,” He kissed her throat.

“Through Victory, my chains are Broken.” One more kiss a little further down her throat. Then he shifted back up, and she could feel his breath hot and heavy above her lips.

“The Force shall free me.”

Her lips parted slightly as a sigh escaped her, and she expectantly waited for his mouth to descend on hers.

But it never did.

He let go of her wrists and got up. And she found herself forced to watch him stalk off into the jungle, leaving her the angry one.  


* * *

  
For just a second, Rey wondered what the cold hard surface under her cheek was before she remembered what had happened, and she scrambled to her feet, ready to fight.

She only had a moment to notice Kylo was frantically pacing in the tiny confines of the ‘fresher before she realized she’d gotten up too quickly, and a wave of lightheadedness overtook her. For a second, she wobbled on her feet, and suddenly he was there to catch her.

“Are you alright? I’m so sorry,” he said with wide and panicked eyes. “Tell me you are all right.”

Considering he was the one who had knocked her out, that made no sense. And she wasn’t about to let him get away with acting sorry for assaulting her. Without thinking, she flung him back away from her with the Force.

There wasn’t far for him to go, but even so, he let out a grunt as he hit the wall, and she thought she heard a slight crack when his head snapped back against it.

Her hand dropped to her belt, grateful to find her lightsaber there, he hadn’t disarmed her. Which, as she thought about it, was strange. As escape attempts went, this wasn’t a very good one.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to-“

She cut him off. “Knock me unconscious? How long have I been out?” Worry about what he might have done to the rest of the Resistance members on board suddenly flared in her gut.

“Only a moment,” he told her, wincing slightly as his fingers investigated the spot where the back of his head had hit the wall. “I’m sorry I should have let you tell me,”

That was the second time he’d apologized to her in the space of a minute. She wasn’t sure that Kylo Ren had ever apologized to her, or anyone else for that matter in his life. It unnerved her. He looked like he might snap at any minute.

She reached out with the Force, and the binders she had foolishly removed from him jumped from the floor into her hands. 

“Wait, please,” he begged her, just one more thing that made her sure he was going insane in front of her. 

He stepped closer to her, but there was no menace in him. His shoulders were hunched, and he looked defeated. He had released the Darkness he had greedily pulled to himself when he had knocked her out.

Even as alarm bells went off in her head that something was terribly wrong, she let him take another step closer, and he rested his forehead against the top of her head and placed one large hand across her stomach.

“I’m sorry I didn’t let you tell me. How long have you known?” he asked.

He was too close, too intimate, in a way she wasn’t prepared for. This time she didn’t use the Force but instead pushed him gently back with her hands.

“Known what?” she asked in frustration. She hated to admit she didn’t know what he was talking about. It felt like giving up an advantage. But his behavior was starting to frighten her, and she needed to understand it.

He let her push him away, and his eyes were large and startled. His mouth opened and shut several times, but nothing came out.

It was too much, whatever was wrong with him . . . She was risking everyone on the transport’s life by leaving him unshackled in whatever state this was.

She quickly snapped the binders around one of his wrists, and he didn’t really seem to notice until the second one closed, and he was shut off from the Force.

“Rey listen,” he started to speak as she went to open the door and drag him back to his guards. “Quiet your Force signature.”

“What does that even mean?” she asked as she began to pull him back towards the others. 

“Just. . . As if you were trying to hide. Quiet it, you’ll see then.”

She frowned at him, but the transport wasn’t large, so they were already back in the main hold with everyone else.

As she sat back down in her chair, she thought about his words. ‘As if you were trying to hide.’ That made quieting her Force signature sound like a useful thing to learn. She chewed her lip for a minute, then realized that there was still a long trip ahead of her, and ‘quieting a Force Signature’ didn’t sound like a destructive use of the Force, so she might as well try practicing.

Once he was seated, she quickly took hers and began trying to concentrate, in part because she was curious about this new trick he had mentioned, and in part because she didn’t want to think about his crazy behavior.

She was deep enough in thought that she barely noticed when the Judge got up to use the ‘fresher, and so it startled her when one of the guards suddenly said, “You should be ashamed of yourself.”

Her back went rigged, and fear surged through her veins. How could the guard know about her and Kylo?

But then she realized that he wasn’t speaking to her, but to Kylo’s attorney Hennis, who was sitting one seat over.

Hennis didn’t seem taken back at the words but only shook their head sadly. “You’re a soldier, what if you were captured?”

“Then the First Order would execute me,” the guard said matter of factly.

“Maybe,” Hennis said. “But maybe not. They have prisoners you know, they have some of ours they. . .” Hennis’ voice trailed off as if speaking was too hard. It was the first time Rey had ever seen any emotion from the attorney. In court, they were always calm and collected.

Leia reached across Rey and squeezed Hennis’ hand. “I’m sure Jenna is okay,” she said softly.

“Wait, Jenna Hennis?” one of the other guards said.

“She’s my daughter,” Jaren Hennis said softly. “She was at the outpost on Rattatak when. . .”

Rey’s eyes went wide. The Resistance had had a listening outpost on Rattatak, which the First Order had discovered about four months ago. The outpost had been attacked, but not from the sky. Instead, the First Order had sent in a Stormtrooper ground assault to take the personal alive, presumably so they could be tortured, and the First Order could learn more about the Resistance’s surveillance capabilities. No one knew for sure what had happened to the people at Rattatak, only that their bodies had not been recovered after the battle.

So Hennis’ daughter was a prisoner of the First Order, assuming she hadn’t already been killed.

“Look, I’m sorry,” the first guard said a little sheepishly, “But she knew the risks, and-“

“I didn’t!” Hennis said, not quite yelling. “I wasn’t asked if I wanted my daughter to fight in this war.”

Everyone in the room shifted uncomfortably. Rey had no family to worry about, but she wondered about the other Resistance members. Had they considered what joining the Resistance meant to their families?

“You are kind to say she is all right, General,” Hennis said as they regained some calm. “But I know that may not be the case. That doesn’t mean there isn’t a chance, for her, and for anyone else who is or will be captured. If we can’t treat our prisoners with respect, how can we ever expect the First Or-“

“What is going on here!” the Judge yelled, having returned from the ‘fresher. “You know you can’t talk about the trial here,” he focused his anger on Hennis.

“It wasn’t him,” the guard who had started the exchange spoke up. “I started it.”

“I don’t care who started it,” the Judge said. “You should know better,” he said to Hennis. “If you’ve tainted the Jury. . .“ The threat hung in the air.

“I would be happy to discuss this with you, Your Honor,” Hennis said, their impassive mask back in place. “But perhaps not here. As you say, we wouldn’t want to expose the Jury to any undue biases.”

The Judge seemed about to say something else, but stopped and nodded. “We will talk about this counselor, later,” the Judge said, taking his seat.

And the uncomfortable silence settled back around all the occupants of the transport.

Rey found herself happy to distract herself with her new task. Turning inward to examine her Force signature, was far preferable to the tension that once again cloaked the occupants of the ship.

At first, it was hard to do. Rey wasn’t sure what she was looking for. So instead, she reached out lightly to examine Leia. Rey had never thought about it much, but there was an unmistakable feel to the General, a specific footprint she left on the Force, a beautiful and calm light. And even if she couldn’t sense it at the moment, she now realized that Kylo Ren had his own footprint, one wrapped in electric darkness.

No, footprint wasn’t the right word. Maybe footstep was better, because not only did it identify the person, but it could, she realized also be used to detect them. 

Now that she’d identified it in others, she turned inward again, trying to silence her own signature. To hide her footsteps, so to speak. She could find it, bright and powerful, but with a hint of darkness crawling at the edges. Time and again, she thought she almost had it; that she had almost hidden away her signature, but there was always something there. Some bit of Light that she couldn’t seem to hide.

She made another attempt, but this time, when she felt that final pinprick of the Force shining through, she grabbed on to it, examined it, trying to understand why there was this power in the center of her that she couldn’t quiet, that she couldn’t still.

She gasped audibly when it clicked into place. And her head jerked up to look at Kylo Ren. His eyes met hers, and he nodded slightly, knowing what she found.

“Rey,” Leia, asked. “Are you alright?”

“I. . . Yes, General. I’m fine.” A pang of guilt ran through Rey. She’d never outright lied to Leia before.

Because Rey was not fine.

She was pregnant.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kylo is reciting the Sith Code to Rey in between kisses. Because you know, through passion I gain strength.


	13. Choices

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey tries to find time to think things through but is corned by the Prosecutor.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all the comments and kudos. I'm so glad you guys are excited by the direction this is going, and I hope I don't disappoint.

Rey couldn't get off the transport fast enough. A life of forced isolation on Jakku was suddenly catching up to her. She needed space by herself to clear her head and get a grasp on the notion that she was pregnant.

The problem was, everyone else wanted off as well. And of course, Kylo Ren had been blindfolded again when they had come back to real space. He was the first to be removed from the shuttle and taken off to whatever new cell had been prepared for him, and Rey wondered if it already had listening devices installed.

Everyone sort of crushed and squeezed their way out of the transport, before milling about as they figured out where to go in this new base.

Rey didn't care where she was supposed to go, she just needed to get away from everyone else so she could think straight.

She had almost made it out of the dock when a hand came down on her shoulder.

"Madam Jedi, do you have time now?" It was the Kappa, the prosecuting attorney. 

"I um," she said, desperately looking for an excuse to get away, worried she had used them all up already.

"Are you all right," the woman asked, her voice suddenly filled with real concern. "Hyperspace doesn't agree with everyone."

"No, I mean, I'm fine with hyperspace, I just, I'm not feeling well. I was going to find the medical bay," that seemed like a perfect excuse to get rid of the woman for a little while longer while Rey got her head on straight.

"Let me help you find it," Kappa said kindly.

Rey couldn't help but feel that the woman was just trying to make sure that Rey didn't escape again.

There were no medical personal here, but there was a medical droid, and that was fine with Rey. She didn't actually want to talk to another person. 

The medical droid seemed almost delighted when it asked her what was wrong with her.

"Um, if you don't mind?" Rey said, looking at Kappa.

"Oh, of course," the other woman said, but she didn't go far, stepping just into the other room.

Rey's attempt to get rid of the attorney was failing miserably, but she realized that coming to the med-bay wasn't a bad idea. After all, she didn't really **know** she was pregnant. Maybe she just didn't understand this whole Force signature thing.

"I think maybe I'm pregnant," she told the medical droid. 

Rey liked droids and enjoyed their company, even C-3PO, who seemed to annoy everyone else, except maybe Leia, who'd kept the droid for decades. But this medical droid was quickly getting on her nerves as it excitedly whirred and began its scans of her.

Perhaps she was being unfair to it. If the dust in the med-bay was anything to go by, the poor droid hadn't had a patient in some time. And it was actually rather nice about it when it pricked her finger to take a blood sample before it moved over to interface with the more powerful medical bay computer.

Kappa had evidently be perched right outside, and once it saw that Rey and the droid were done speaking for the moment, she re-entered the room.

"So there are some things we need to go over before you go on the stand," Kappa said without a pause. "I don't want to catch you by surprise. And-"

"I'm sorry," the medical droid interrupted. "Only family members are allowed during diagnosis."

Kappa didn't bat an eyelash. "We're partners," she said before continuing. "I also want to confirm my research, make sure there are no holes the Defense can poke it in."

She was still speaking, but Rey barely heard her. The woman had just declared that she was Rey's lover, all so that she could talk about a trial. Kappa was audacious, and Rey actually thought under other circumstances she could have been friends with this woman. Kappa was undoubtedly the sort of woman you would want to storm a Star Destroyer with, assuming she could fire a blaster.

"Congratulations!" the droid said loudly, interrupting Kappa mid-sentence. "You are going to be mothers!"

Rey's mind went blank at the confirmation she was pregnant. It reminded her of when she had almost drowned on Garnik V, of being pulled by invisible currents while strapped to a device that was meant to save her, and no air.

And how had she become a plural? Then she remembered Kappa's lie so the droid wouldn't force her out, and Rey was angry. Angry that of all the people in the universe, this stranger was the one to hear the news with her.

"Leave us," Kappa said to the droid. Her face was hard, and yet the color almost seemed to be draining out of it. And Rey wondered what right this woman had to be so affected by something that was none of her business.

"I'll just leave you two to celebrate," the droid said in a too cheery voice. "But remember, pre-natal care can't begin too soon!"

As the droid left the room, Kappa sat down next to her.

"I'm sorry," the older woman said.

"You should be," Rey snapped back. "You shouldn't be here."

Kappa let out a half-hearted laugh. "Trust me, karma may already be getting me for that one." She tried to take Rey's hand, but Rey pulled back. "He doesn't have to get away with this."

"What? Who?" Rey asked, confused by the statement.

"Kylo Ren," Kappa replied. "I know this isn't easy. It never is. And I know it's tempting to think that this is only about you. That this is for you to carry by yourself. But Rey, if it happened to you, it probably happened to others. I know this won't be easy, but you're a Jedi. If you come forward if you show that you have no shame, that you did nothing wrong, think of all the other woman it could help."

Rey was confused. There was something almost rehearsed about what the attorney was saying. As if she'd had this conversation before. But also a sincere and genuine feeling of concern radiating off the other woman.

The problem was that once again, Rey was trapped in one of those conversations where the other person assumed she had some sort of context that Rey was lacking. But the context Rey did have was the pregnancy, and suddenly it clicked in her mind.

"Wait, do you think Kylo Ren raped me?" Rey blurted out.

"Are you saying he's not the father?"

"He is, but he didn't. . ." Rey gigged, a little hysterical bubble of laughter. "If anything, I was the one who jumped him." And suddenly it wasn't a giggle anymore, but a full-bodied laugh that she couldn't control. That brought tears to her eyes and made her almost double over.

Rey was suddenly aware of all the times she had to tried to shy away from her title as Jedi, uncomfortable with all the hopes and dreams placed on her shoulders. But the result of that she now realized was that to someone like Kappa, she was just a young woman in way over her head. 

And maybe she was. But even if she hadn't been a Jedi, Rey was a scavenger of Jakku. Jakku was not a peaceful planet, and more than once, someone had gotten a little too handsy with her. They usually ended up unconscious. Even so, Rey had known to avoid certain crews and gangs. She had always felt sure she could handle any single attacker, but she was careful to avoid groups. She could probably take them like she had been able to when some of Plutt's men had tried to grab BB-8, but she knew better than to risk it.

No, she was Rey of Jakku, proud to be a scavenger, proud to have survived a planet that wanted nothing more than to grind her into the sand. She was Rey of Jakku, and she had stood head to head against Kylo Ren and won.

But she could see how to this woman she was just a scrawny young girl, and Kylo Ren was a huge man who was used to getting his way in everything. Who was known for violence. She understood where Kappa was coming from. That didn't make it seem any less insulting.

And although she might be able to hold her own agains the most dangerous warriors of the Galaxy, Rey was quickly realizing how unprepared she was for motherhood. She'd only known an hour, and already the weight of responsibility felt like it was going to crush her.

And so Rey laughed until she could barely breathe. 

If Kappa didn't know how to respond to the laughter, she did manage to find a tissue for Rey to wipe away the tears that had started to stream down her cheeks.

It was a kind gesture, but Rey realized she didn't want kindness from this woman.

"You will forget what you heard, and you will find your room." Rey intoned.

"I could hardly forget that," Kappa said, clearly unaware that Rey had just tried to use a Jedi mind trick on her. "But Rey, you can control this. You can retake control of your life."

"I lost control of my life the day I first picked up a lightsaber," Rey told her. "Please don't tell anyone, I need to figure this out."

"Of course," Kappa said. "But Rey, confronting the man who hurt you-"

"He didn't hurt me," Rey snapped back. "I don't think you're listening. He didn't rape me, he didn't hurt me. I've been trying to stay away from you because even if he is a monster, even if he deserves this trial, I love him, and I don't want to be part of convicting him."

Rey hadn't really realized what she had said until she saw the look on Kappa's face. 

'I love him,' she had been doing everything in her power to keep from even thinking the words, much less saying them.

_Say it, Rey._

_Say what?_

_Whatever it is that weighs you down. Whatever truth you are hiding from._

Had he known she wondered? When she had stood guard over him in the 'fresher. Had he known, or was he just hoping?

Because now that she had said it, she knew that it had been true for some time. How far back, she wasn't sure. Certainly in the hut on Ahch-To when they had touched across the Galaxy. Yes, she now realized, she'd been in love with him back then. It's why she had gone to try and save him.

But part of her wondered if it had been even further back than that.

_You still want to kill me?_

_That's what happens when you're being hunted by a stranger in a mask._

The mask had offended her; had felt so wrong. Was that because she already knew the face that was hiding underneath.

Rey shook her head to clear her thoughts. She was just getting silly now. She couldn't have loved him before they met, or at that first meeting. Definitely not the first time they met.

And yet. . . 

"Are you saying you won't testify against him?" Kappa's voice had become cold and hard.

"Do I have a choice?"

Rey could see some sort of internal struggle play out over Kiandra Kappa's face. A tiny internal war, that Rey was not a part of.

"Yes," the woman finally said. "Under Hosnian law. . . One parent can't be forced to testify against another parent."

"Even though the child isn't born yet?" Rey asked.

Kappa nodded. "Yes. As long as you're pregnant, and since I'm aware of it. . . I can't force you to testify."

Rey could see how hard it was for the other woman to admit this, and she was struck by a bit of admiration for this woman, even is she hardly liked her right now. Whatever moral code Kiandra Kappa had bound herself to, she was willing to follow it, even if it was inconvenient. Kappa didn't have to tell Rey these things, the attorney could have pretended not to know Rey was pregnant. But she didn't. Instead, she made one last entreaty.

"Please, Rey, you may be the key to making sure that Kylo Ren doesn't go free. You said it yourself, he's a monster. Don't you have a duty as a Jedi to make sure he is punished, regardless of your feelings?"

"Maybe," Rey admitted. "But maybe if the Jedi had been more forgiving, more willing to give chances, there wouldn't have been a Kylo Ren in the first place."

She could tell the other woman didn't understand. How could she? Like everyone else, she was unaware of the moment when Luke Skywalker had change one boy's fate, and possibly the Galaxy's with it.

Luke had admitted to her that it was fear the had almost caused him to strike down his nephew. Fear that Ben Solo would only bring death and destruction to the Galaxy. And he hadn't been wrong. Kylo Ren had done terrible things. The vision had come true.

A Jedi master devoid of attachment might have made the choice faster, not out of fear, but out of reason. The life of one boy, for the safety of millions of others.

But also, a man who wasn't afraid to love his nephew, who refused to give up on him, a man like that might have saved the Galaxy from Kylo Ren through love and patience.

There was no way to know.

Rey's choices were not so simple. She had already begun to consider ending the pregnancy. But it seemed that at least until the trial was over, that wasn't an option. Kylo needed one person on his side, whether he deserved it or not. Maybe even more so because he didn't deserve it.

"I won't testify against him," Rey said firmly. "And honestly, you probably wouldn't want me to. I don't think I'd say things you'd want to hear about him."

Kappa nodded and stood up. "You can't always change your mind. Just let me know if you do."  


* * *

  
**Garnik V 5 days after the Crash**

The rain pounded desperately against their shelter. Kylo might have enjoyed it earlier, but it had refused to stop. There was nothing they could do while the sky relentless poured water down on them, and even the shelter had ceased to be truly dry since the rain was falling faster than the ground could absorb it, and they had built their shelter on as flat an area as they could find, so the water pooled around them instead of running down into the sea.

If this were going to become a regular occurrence, Rey would have to try and make some sort of drainage system. But for now, there was nothing to do but try and stay as dry as possible.

What now seemed like a lifetime ago, Rey had delighted when she'd seen her first rainstorm on Ahch-to. But if the storms there had been intense, they were at least brief. They didn't drag on for hours like on this world.

Finally, Kylo broke the strained silence that sat between them.

"I see you made your own lightsaber."

"Well, someone broke mine."

"It was mine," he countered sharply.

She didn't really want to fight, so she didn't argue, just went back to watching the rain and thinking up ways to improve their shelter.

"May I see it?" he asked after several minutes had passed.

For a moment, she didn't know what he was talking about, having thoroughly distracted herself. But then she realized he meant her lightsaber.

"I'm not giving you my only weapon," she told him.

He snorted. "It's far from your only weapon." He paused for a moment. "I'll let you see mine."

That actually did interest her. She had never studied the Skywalker lightsaber while it was whole, only once it had been destroyed. She had always wondered if she'd put hers together right, and she was deeply curious to look at the construction of his. But she was also worried that he would make fun of hers, that he'd tell her she'd made it wrong. After all, she'd had no one to teach her.

In the end, curiosity won out.

She unclipped it from her belt and extended it to him. He reached for it, but she pulled back, he hadn't offered his as he'd promised.

He shrugged, seemingly amused by her reticence, and offered her the large hilt of his lightsaber.

Once it was in her hands, she turned it with fascination, tracing the wires and the casing. She wanted to open it, to examine the crystal and the matrix emitter. She hadn't figured out how he had made the cross-guards something she hadn't thought twice about until she'd made her own.

But she wasn't sure he'd take kindly to her taking it apart, so she resisted. 

Then she heard the hum of plasma as Kylo Ren ignited her lightsaber.

Instinctively she shifted her grip, on his weapon her thumb moving to the activator before she realized he wasn't attacking but only examining the blade.

The purple light cast strange shadows on his face, and she couldn't tell if he was smiling or smirking.

"What?" she asked defensively. 

"The color," he said as if that explained everything. "Not that I'm surprised." 

"Not everything has to be black and red, you know. There are other colors in the Galaxy." She actually felt a little defensive about the color. When she had made it, she had hoped it would turn out green like Master Luke's had been, green was her favorite color. But she supposed it didn't really matter. It was hers, and she had made it.

He extinguished the blade, and suddenly he was examining her as intently as she had been examining his lightsaber a moment ago.

"The color of the blade," he began to intone softly, "is determined by the focus of the creator as they meditate on the crystal. If one is attuned to the Dark Side, the crystal will be red. Green is the color of the old Jedi Consulars, those who seek peace and mediation. Blue is the color of those who seek to protect through strength. And purple. . . That is the color of those who belong neither to the Light or the Darkness or perhaps, belong to both."

His voice was deep and calming, and yet a shiver went down her spine at his last words. She wanted to argue with him, to insist the color didn't mean anything, but she could feel the truth of it. She reflected on the days she had spent making the blade, the doubt, and fear that had been inside of her as she had tried to prove she had a place as a Jedi. Looking back, she was almost surprised that the blade hadn't turned as scarlet as his.

And then she realized something.

"You're blade, it was blue," she blurted out. "Back at the temple, you wanted to be a protector."

For just a moment, he looked at her uncomfortably. As if she had something that stung a little too much. Perhaps it was the nature of the knowledge. She only knew what his old lightsaber had looked like because of the memory he'd shared of his Uncle's betrayal.

But the moment passed, and he handed back her lightsaber. "Wanted?" he asked. "The purpose of the First Order is to protect the Galaxy. To bring about peace and stability, and keep it citizen's safe."

She realized as she took back her lightsaber, that she still had his. He hadn't forced her to return it in an even trade. But then she wasn't going to try and keep it she realized, even though she still longed to open it up and take it apart. 

She handed it back. 

"The First Order is about power," she replied.

"Perhaps it was, under Snoke," he admitted. "But power is necessary. Only the strong can protect the weak."

"Please," she argued. "You despise weakness, don't pretend you want to protect it."

"In myself, yes," he agreed. "It is a luxury I can not afford. That is why. . ." His voice trailed off, and his eyes seemed to consume her for a moment. "The storm is letting up," he said, suddenly getting up.

As far as Rey could tell, the rain was coming down just as hard as it had been before, but even so, he got up and walked out of their shelter, ignoring the sheets of water the drenched him almost instantly.

_That is why. . . _

The look in his eyes, she'd seen it before.

An outstretched hand. 

_Please. . ._

And for the first time, Rey wondered what might have happened if she'd taken his hand.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I've always found it odd that in the US (and probably the UK since we got a lot of our laws from there) that you can't be called to testify against a spouse. But it gave me the idea of a law meant to protect children (at least emotionally) where you don't have to testify against your child's other parent. Because with all the things that are hard about raising a child, having to explain that you were legally forced to send their father or mother to jail would be even harder.


	14. Anxiety

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Maz testifies.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, it looks like a bunch of new people discovered this story with the last update. Welcome. Thanks for all the Kudos and comments, and thanks for everyone who was already reading along. I think I'm going to try updating twice a week going forward. Saturdays for sure, and probably on an update on Sundays as well. Especially

Kinship was not something Rey would have ever expected to feel for Maz Kanata. Not that she didn’t like Maz, it’s just there was something slightly unsettling about the older woman. But as Maz rattled off an inventory of every single thing that had been damaged or destroyed when the First Order attacked, from buildings and speeders to the contents of a produce stand that had been decimated, including 37 takashi peaches, 46 balian apples, and 94 sathir cherries.

It was amusing to watch as Kiandra Kappa struggled to decide whether to stop the ongoing inventory of property damage because it was boringly specific or to let the woman continue to make a point about how destructive the First Order was.

But Rey understood. They said Maz Kanata had run her watering hole for a thousand years, and although that may have been right, Rey was willing to bet before that she hadn’t had much. Rey could imagine Maz’s early years when every possession was precious, a thing to be cataloged and accounted for. When every item needed to be double-checked to make sure it hadn’t been stolen.

Maybe she hadn’t been a scavenger, but once, long ago, Maz Kanata had known deprivation, and it had left its marks. In retrospect, Rey should have realized it when she had stumbled into one of the Maz’s hoards. A collection of odds and ends kept safe in case someday something there was needed.

To be fair, Rey had been distracted by Force visions, not to mention the other hundred crazy things that had happened on her first day away from Jakku.

And Rey, realized, it was a testament to Maz’s spirit, that she had been willing to so easily part with the lightsaber, something so rare and precious. Even now, Rey sometimes thought about returning to her At-At and seeing if any of her possessions remained. She missed her doll, her helmet, and she hated to think that perfect good bedding, pans, bowls, and all the other things she’d owned, we’re now going to waste. 

Then again, her departure from Jakku had hardly been subtle. No doubt others had long since raided the At-At to take her possessions. It was likely just an empty shell with marks carved on the walls. Assuming someone else hadn’t made it their home.

Maz’s litany of grievances finally came to an end. Rey was just grateful that the woman was still on Takodanna, giving her testimony remotely. Rey wasn’t ready to be subject to that woman’s knowing stare again.

With the full catalog of destruction entered into the record, Kappa set down, and Hennis stood to take their turn at cross-examination.

Hennis’s line of questioning was reasonably straightforward. They pulled up a bit of footage from an X-wing’s flight recorder. It came from one of Poe’s wingmen. The fighter took a shot at a TIE-fighter, but the TIE spun away in time, and the blast hit a building, causing a small explosion of stone.

Hennis began to drill Maz then, on every bit of property damage, she had reported. A battle was going on, could she prove this bit of damage or that was done by the First Order? How did she know it wasn’t the Resistance, or Chewbacca, or even one of her own people that hadn’t caused each piece of damage.

“Yes, yes, yes,” Maz said at last. “You’re very clever. It was a battle. Things happen in battles. But there wouldn’t have been a battle if the First Order hadn’t started the attack. They began the whole thing.”

“Didn’t it begin because you don’t inspect vessels landing at your castle? Because you allow all sorts of illegal behavior in your establishment. You made yourself the perfect place for someone who had just stolen a YT-1300f Corellian freighter of some notoriety to land without questions being asked?”

“Oh, yes,” Maz agreed. “I let anyone land as long as they don’t cause trouble. I would have happily served Ben Solo a drink if he’d just walked in the door looking for information.”

Rey had to try hard not to laugh at that. Not because she didn’t believe Maz, but because she did. Rey would have given just about anything to see Kylo Ren sit down at a table in Maz’s cantina. To see Maz either demand, he take off his helmet, or maybe to see her get up on the table and take it off of him herself.

“One final question,” Hennis said. “Is Takodonna part of the New Republic?”

Maz snorted in derision at the statement. “New Republic, Old Republic, Empire, every time I blink my eyes, you have a new government. No, we are an independent world.”

“And as an independent world, you have your own justice system?”

“Oh yes,” Maz agreed. “You send that boy to me, and I’ll take care of it. I’ll make sure he pays for every last sathir cherry.”

Rey wondered if the cherries were especially valuable. But regardless, Rey suspected that Maz’s form of justice was not what the Resistance was looking for. Something told her, that if Maz were in charge of punishing Kylo Ren, she’d have him bussing tables, or maybe working in the kitchen.

That should have seemed like a ridiculous punishment, considering his crimes, and yet Rey couldn’t help but wonder if there wasn’t something somehow fitting in that. To take the man who wanted to rule the galaxy, and make him serve others. It wasn’t going to happen, but maybe that was a pity. It would probably be good for him if it weren’t so impossible.

“No further questions,” Hennis said.

The encrypted transmission to Maz was cut. And Hennis took their seat.

“Your next witness, Prosecutor?” the Judge asked.

Slowly Kappa rose, and as if it pained her to say so, she said, “We have no further witnesses Your Honor, the Prosecution rests.”

Rey could feel several sets of eyes turn towards her. The new courtroom didn’t have spectators the way the old one had. On the main base, they had let anyone who wasn’t on duty, and who wasn’t part of the trial to watch. Rey had a special dispensation to attend the trial since she was a Jedi. She was there in case Kylo Rey tried to escape, and the assumption was that she would not be influenced by the testimony of others and would tell the truth precisely as it happened. She had learned from Leia just how many special rules applied to the Jedi back in the Old Republic, laws that the New Republic had adopted. After all, Luke Skywalker was their savior; how could they not grant him the same privileges?

It made Rey uncomfortable. She wasn’t sure she deserved the title of Jedi, much less any special privileges. But it meant that right now, she had Leia were the only spectators in the courtroom. On this smaller base, everyone who wasn’t part of the trial was either on duty or sleeping because they were on the night shift.

Even so, everyone knew who she was. And everyone had expected her to testify. Hennis, the Judge, the Jury, they all turned to look at her in surprise. Only Kylo didn’t turn to look at her, he continued to stare ahead as he always did during the trial. And she wondered what he was thinking.

The Judges nodded finally, then declared a recess. The day wasn’t quite over, but it was close, and he decided they would have the Defense start with their case in the morning.

Which suddenly left Rey with free time she wasn’t really prepared for. There were so few people on this base that she was no longer needed to guard Leia. Everyone here had Leia and Dameron’s full trust.

She was also a little afraid of being pinned down, being asked why she wasn’t testifying. She wasn’t ready to answer that question. So she took off to explore the base, hoping that she would be able to keep away from the others.

Not long into her explorations, she found a large empty cargo room, and she realized that it was the perfect space for her to train in. She’d been neglecting her training since the trial began, and she had her lightsaber with her; she was expected to carry it into the court in case Kylo Ren tried to escape.

But training didn’t go well. Rey couldn’t quite fall into her normal state of calm. Usually, running through her routine became a kind of meditation, one form blending smoothly into the next. But she couldn’t seem to achieve that now.

At first, she tried to tell herself that it was just because she was out of practice. Then she told her self that it was the pregnancy, her body was changing. But she had to admit that she hadn’t yet noticed any physical changes. If Kylo hadn’t detected it with the Force, she would not yet have realized she was pregnant.

No, it wasn’t the physical changes the pregnancy was causing, it was the emotional ones. 

And Rey knew what she had to do. It was finally time she talked to Kylo.  


* * *

  
**Garnik V 28 days after the Crash**

“No,” Rey said firmly, her arms crossed across her chest.

“You might enjoy it, it’ll be fun,” Kylo told her.

“It will not be fun, it will be wet,” she argued.

“I would think someone from a desert plant would enjoy the water more?” he was trying to goad her now.

“I love water. Water that you can drink. That,” she nodded towards the ocean. “Is just a big bunch of poison. Poison and fish.”

“I thought you liked fish,” he said, trying not to sound hurt.

Internally she cursed. Kylo Ren and his damn cooking. He loved to do it, she realized and was also very self-conscious about it. Always trying to figure out if she liked it or not. Continuously tinkering with the few recipes he’d figured out with the limited supplies on the island, trying to perfect the meals he made.

“I like dead cooked fish,” she said. “But they are not dead and cooked in the ocean. They are alive, and they wriggle.”

“You won’t even know they are there,” he promised. 

“I’ll know,” she disagreed.

“You don’t need to be afraid-“

“I’m not afraid,” she interrupted him.

But he just kept talking. “I won’t let you drown. Please, Rey, just let me teach you to swim.”

“No,” she said firmly, and turned and walked away from the beach.

Nothing was going to get her into the water, she was not going back into the ocean, and that was final.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know you really want Rey and Kylo in the same room (well that's not a courtroom). Next time I promise. At least I didn't push off this short update until next week. And Maz deserved her day in court.


	15. Balance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey goes to speak to Kylo. On Garnik V they test out their raft.

Rey was surprised how easy it was to put the guard to sleep. It wasn't as if she had been in a position to observe how it was done when Kylo Ren had captured her on Takodana. But still, Rey managed to gently knock out the guard who was tasked with watching the security cameras around Kylo Ren's cell. She'd have to come back, delete the footage once she was done speaking to Kylo, just to be safe, but as long as no one came to check on the guard, he would sleep until she was done, and no one would be the wiser.

Looking at the screens, she could see that Kylo was pacing the small confines of his cell. 

When she opened the door, he froze and opened his mouth as if to speak but then stopped.

"It's okay," she told him. "No one's listening at the moment, and I'll delete the recordings."

He nodded but still didn't speak. That's when Rey realized that unlike her, other people overhearing them, wasn't his concern.

He stood there awkwardly in front of her, his hands bound in front, and she suddenly wasn't sure what to say anymore. So she said the first thing that came to mind. 

"It's a bad design," she looked at his binders. "Why not a collar? That seems an easier way to keep a prisoner from using the Force long term."

"It's because they are a Jedi design," he said, a knowing smile tugging at his lips. She knew that whatever he was going to say, she wasn't going to like. "Jedi trials were quick. You went before the Council, and if you were judged to have fallen to the Dark Side, they executed you. Otherwise, they let you go."

"I don't believe that," she said. "Dead or innocent couldn't have been the only outcomes."

"No," he agreed. "If you weren't powerful enough to be considered truly dangerous, they simply sent you on your way. If you were believed to be redeemable, then you were expected to do whatever the Jedi Master they put in charge of you told you to. But the Jedi didn't tolerate powerful Dark Side users. If you were dangerous enough that they needed to restrain your power, then yes, they executed you."

Rey wanted to argue, to tell him he was wrong, but she realized she had no idea. She knew very little about the Jedi Council. Luke had never taught her, and although she had tried hard to decipher the Jedi texts she had taken from Ahch-To, she hadn't gotten very far, and they seemed to be mostly philosophical works, not legal ones.

And this wasn't why she was here. It was probably best to not tempt fate by staying here longer than she needed to. She wasn't ready to answer questions if someone found the guard.

"So anyway, I'm. . ." She didn't really want to say it, but she knew she had to. "I'm pregnant." 

He only nodded.

She has been pretty sure he knew, but still, she expected him to say something.

"You don't have to worry about it, though," she started to speak to fill the silence. "Once the trial is over, I'll take care of it."

She hadn't realized she made the decision, not until she was saying it out loud, but what else could she do? It's not as if there was another choice.

"Because it's mine." He finally spoke. She wasn't sure if it was meant to be a question or not. "You're going to kill our child because it's mine." 

Not a question then.

"It's not a child, not yet," she argued. "And why are you upset? You were very clear about not wanting children."

"I never- Not wanting to raise a child on an uninhabited planet is very different from not wanting children." He argued.

"I'm sorry, tell me exactly one life choice you have ever made that would lead a person to think you wanted a family?" She snapped at him.

She had come here to do him a favor. He had enough to worry about without worrying about this. She had come to put his mind at ease, and he was treating her like she was a terrible person for doing what needed to be done.

"You want one," he said softly. "It's all you've ever wanted, a family."

"I wanted to not have been abandoned by my parents. That's different," she argued.

And it was. Rey had never really thought about having her own family. How could she think about that? She could barely keep herself fed, how could she care for a child as well? And sure, her days scavenging on Jakku were behind her, but what did she know about being a mother?

Her own mother had abandoned her. And the only other mother she really knew was Leia. And it seemed like Leia Organa should have been a great mother, but her son was on trial for murder and destroying an entire star system, so clearly something had gone wrong somewhere there.

How could Rey ever expect to do any better? She was bound to mess up any child.

“But you _were_ abandoned,” he said. His words weren't cruel; however, they were sad. He tried to reach out and stroke her cheek, but she pulled back. "You can't ever have that family back, Rey, but you can have a new one. You can have a future."

"With you? Ruling the Galaxy?"

She regretted the words as they left her mouth. She saw Kylo flinch as if she'd struck him. But that was the problem. The problem he seemed to be ignoring. He was the Supreme Leader, and she was the Resistance Jedi. Even ignoring the trial, this wouldn't work out for them. And if he was found guilty and executed? Well, it wouldn't be his fault that he wouldn't be there to help her raise their child. Except yes, it would be because he had done the things that got him executed.

But still, the hurt on his face, made her wish she could take it back.

"So it is because it's mine." His voice was cold, and he took a step back.

He made it sound like she was out to kill his child as if it was personal revenge against him.

But before she could protest, he continued, "Why wait until the trial is done then? Why not just do it now? If you so sure."

"Because I don't have to testify against you if we have a child, it's some Hosnian law," she explained.

"You've told everyone then?" he looked confused.

"What? No! No one knows, well except for um Kappa, but mostly because she's nosey and obnoxious."

"And will you tell the General?" he asked.

“You mean your _mother_? No, there's no reason to tell her. She doesn't know about. . ." Rey gestured helplessly at the air. "This."

He sat down on his bunk. "And what is this?" he asked, leaning against the wall, and bringing one foot up on the bed.

She didn't have answers for him. Not an answer that wouldn't hurt him that wouldn't hurt them both. Because there wasn't a point in this. Whatever they'd had on Garnik V was gone now. A strange interlude in her life, like a dream she'd woken up from. And this, this is what was leftover when the dream was ended.

She turned intending to leave, but he jumped up and put a hand on her shoulder. "Please," his voice was desperate. "Don't go, not yet. I'm sorry."

The pain and loneliness in his voice nearly broke her.

_You’re not alone._

_Neither are you_

But she had left him alone, and worse, she hadn't even realized she was doing it until now.

"No, I am," she said, turning back to face him. "I'm sorry I haven't. . . That I don't know what to do."

"Don't you?" he asked, stepping in closer to her. His bound hands moved from her shoulder to cup her face. He bent down and rested his forehead against hers.

"Close your eyes," he told her.

Despite the fact he had recently knocked her out trying to escape, at this moment she wanted to trust him, and so she did.

"Breath, feel the Force move through you," he intoned. "Shut the rest of it out, none of it matters the fears, the insecurities, the love, the pain. There is only the Force moving through you."

That was easier said than done, but although meditation wasn't one of Rey's strong suits, she wasn't a stranger to it either.

Slowly she did as he said. She cleared her mind and found her center. She found the Force, and she tried to align herself with it, but it was elusive. It was as if the ground under her feet was unstable; she kept losing her footing.

She pulled away from Kylo.

"What did you see?" he asked.

"See?" she laughed a little angrily. "I didn't see anything. I can't find my balance."

"Why?" he asked, and she wondered if he knew the answer. 

"Because there's a hole. There's a piece I'm cut off from."

He nodded. Of course, he had known. He was the hole. With the binders on, he was cut off from the Force and cut off from her.

He reached his hands out to her. "You know what to do."

And she did. She'd done half of it already. No one was watching. No one was likely to find the guard. She could remove the binders. They could escape and then. . . 

That was the problem, she wasn't going to go back to the First Order with him. There was nowhere for them to go.

"I can't," was all she said as she turned and left.

This time she didn't let him stop her. After all, she still had to erase the video of this so that no one would know it had ever happened.

**Garnik V 29 Days after the Crash**

"Don't think you are forgiven," Rey said, trying her best to sound stern despite the fact that she was very cold and wet.

"Admit it," he said, "You had fun."

She tried to ignore him as she quickly built up the fire. She also took his cape to wrap herself in. He could freeze, but she wasn't going to.

But if she were honest, she'd have to admit that once the terror had worn off, it was fun.

Kylo had insisted they test the raft, and since she'd helped make it, she needed to be there to see if worked correctly or not. He told her that all she'd have to do was sit on top of the raft to see what happened.

But then he'd pushed it further and further away from the shore. The raft itself worked fine. It did what a raft needed to do, it floated.

She had wanted to head back to shore after the initial test, but he had insisted that for it to be any good, he had to be sure he could get on and off of it easily.

Off was easy, but when he tried to get back on, he asked her to help him.

She should have realized it was a trap, but foolishly she offered him her hand, and the bastard pulled her off the raft into the ocean.

No, he was not forgiven for that. He would never be forgiven for that. He had betrayed her trust, and even the feeling of his arms around her as he held her in the water wasn't enough to make up for that.

But slowly, he had convinced her to let him teach her. He showed her how to lay black and simply float in the water, as well as how to tread water. It wasn't much, and it wasn't really swimming, but at least she wouldn't drown right away.

And maybe it had been a little fun, but she was never going to admit it. And now she was just cold and wet.

They sat near the fire, and he began to pull away the cape she had wrapped around her like a blanket.

"Hey, this is mine now, I didn't agree to be wet," she protested.

"Let me help you warm-up," he told her, sitting behind her and running his large hands up and down her arms to warm her up.

"I thought warming up lead to a race of inbred Force mutants," she said, but she didn't try to push him away.

They'd been circling each other for the last several days. Both of them wanting, but also a little afraid of what the consequences of touching might be. It always seemed like when one of them forgot, the other remembered.

"I can touch you without getting you pregnant, you know," he said.

"True," she thought, heat rising to her face. Some of the favorite ways Kylo touched her, especially with his tongue, would not lead to babies. "But that requires self-control."

"I can be controlled," he said. Rey wasn't sure if the way he kissed her neck was proof of that or not. It was certainly proof that she didn't know how good her own control was, once he started touching her.

"Who said I can be?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks so much for all the Kudos and comments. My first draft of this chapter Rey walked out of the cell the first time and Kylo didn't stop her. But some of the comments made me realize that more was needed here. So thanks.


	16. Imperfect

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey runs into Hennis.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, this story now has over 200 kudos. Thank you all so much.

Rey knew she should feel guilty about having compromised base security, about using the Force to put the guard to sleep and erasing the recordings of her conversation with Kylo Ren. She knew she should feel bad, but thee awfulness of the conversation seemed like it's own reward.

Not that she knew what she'd expected to happen. She just knew that she had to do something.

The trial had taken over her life. It felt as if nothing could progress, nothing could happen until the trial was over. Until then, she was caught in a suspended state, waiting with dread for the verdict.

How much worse must it be for Kylo?

That made her feel far more guilty than sneaking into his cell had. His life was on the line. Everyone knew this trial would end in his execution; certainly he must know that too. Was it any surprise then, that when he realized that he could be a father, that some part of him could live on once he was dead that he wanted to hold on to that?

The Resistance would execute him, and all that would be left was the child she was carrying. Suddenly Rey was less sure about ending the pregnancy. She would be able to keep a part of Ben Solo, a piece that was never ruined by the darkness.

But was that enough. Was that a good enough reason to be a mother?

And the same gnawing fear came back. How could Rey possibly be a mother? What did she knew about families, or love, or caring for another person? What if she ended up abandoning her child the way her mother abandoned her?

The dismal train of thought was interrupted as she got to her room. To her surprise, waiting for her outside the door was Jaren Hennis.

"Um, hello?" she said.

"Master Rey," Hennis said, smiling. "I was hoping I could have a few minutes of your time?"

"I? Why not?" Rey shrugged. She was too emotionally exhausted to find an excuse to send him away. 

She opened the door to her quarters. There weren't that many people on the base, so she had been given an officer's quarters. Not that they were fancy, but she had her own 'fresher, and a table with chairs. 

"Would you like some tea?" she asked. Unlike Kappa, who had been chasing her down since the trial started, she'd had no real contact with Hennis since the attorney had first arrived. 

"Thank you, yes." They smiled pleasantly. "Do you know I've been terrified of you?" A look of shock crossed Rey's face. She didn't realize she'd become menacing in her role as Leia's bodyguard. "Oh, I don't mean like that. I mean as far as the trial's concerned.

"I was sure that Kappa was just toying with me. Keeping your testimony to the end because it was the thing that was going to destroy my whole case. I mean, trying to cross-examine the pretty Jedi that was kidnapped twice and tortured by Kylo Ren, not an easy task, not without turning a jury against you."

"Oh," Rey nodded. Unsure what she was supposed to say.

"And then the Prosecution rested their case without calling you to the stand," Hennis continued. "Now, my first thought was that you know something that will exonerate my client, though I can't imagine what that could be. So, of course, I did the only responsible thing an attorney could do, I asked him about it. But he insists that I shouldn't call you to the stand. That, in fact, your testimony will be damning, but he won't tell me why. So-"

"When did you talk to him?" Rey interrupted a little too urgently. Did Hennis know she'd visited Kylo?

"Uh, right after we got out of court today, of course."

Rey relaxed. So before she had gone to talk to Kylo, Hennis didn't know anything.

Hennis was watching her carefully but only continued. "So I have to ask, Master Jedi, did the Prosecution make a huge mistake by not calling you to the stand, or can you help my client?"

"Please, just call me Rey," she said, mostly to give herself a moment to think.

She didn't want to tell Hennis about why Kappa hadn't called her to the stand, but maybe she had to. Otherwise, Hennis would try to make her testify.

Luckily the tea was ready, and as Rey poured them each a cup, she figured out what to say.

"I have no idea if Kappa made a mistake or not. All of this trial stuff, it's new to me. On Jakku, we didn't have trials. People did terrible things, and no one punished them for it unless they crossed someone stronger and meaner than them. We didn't expect justice. It's honestly a bit of a strange idea to me that a bunch of strangers would come in, and . . . I'm not sure what the point is. You can't set things right. Guilty or innocent, the dead are still dead."

"I suppose it depends on who you ask," Hennis said. "You're too young to remember the Empire, but I do. The Empire used the court system as another means of control. A way to feed its labor camps, a way to keep the populace afraid and inline. But that was never justice."

Hennis took a small sip of tea, testing the temperature, and seemed to decide it was still too hot.

"But the New Republic justice system is different," Hennis continued. "It fails from time to time, I'm worried it's about to fail catastrophically at the moment, but most of the time it gets it right. Even so, different planets have different views on justice. For some, it's more like revenge. The point is to punish the guilty. Most people agree that it does deter people from committing crimes, most people won't risk getting caught because they fear being punished, and some people believe that the point is rehabilitation. Does that help?"

Rey realized she liked Hennis, which was surprising considering the aggressive way in court they had gone after her friends. 

"Yes, I suppose so, except, how can Kylo Ren be rehabilitated if he's executed?" she asked.

"As I said, not everyone agrees on what the purpose of the justice system is. Not all planets have the death penalty. Hosnian Prime was one of the few Core Worlds that did."

"What do you believe?" Rey asked. She found she was enjoying the conversation. And maybe if she distracted Hennis with all this legal theory, they would forget about why Rey wasn't testifying.

"I'm not sure anymore," Hennis admitted. "I used to believe that everyone deserved a second chance, that people could do evil things, but people themselves weren't evil. Then I met Kylo Ren. . ."

"You think he's evil?"

That actually seemed to surprise Hennis. "Don't you? Isn't that fundamental to the Jedi belief system, there's an evil Dark side, and good Light side?"

Rey shook her head. "It's not that simple. It's not that there isn't a Light side and a Dark side, there is, but there's also life and death. They are binary and opposite, and yet without death, there could be no life. Snoke said that Kylo Ren's equal in the Light would arise, that I was that person. It stands to reason then, if he's executed a new powerful Dark side user will appear to balance me out. And so on. The Force requires balance, and so on it goes. I'm not sure if it ever ends."

She had been speaking the thoughts as they came to her. She'd never quite thought this through before. Suddenly she felt like she understood a little better why Master Luke had been so eager for the Jedi to end. Otherwise, the cycle never ended. The Emperor died, and Snoke rose in his place. But if she and Kylo balanced each other out. . .

"Fascinating," Hennis said. "Do you think Kylo Ren should be executed?"

"No," she replied without thinking. "I mean. . . I know he's done terrible things. But killing him doesn't solve anything. Do you really believe he's evil?"

"I don't know," Hennis admitted. "I've defended a lot of people who've done a lot of bad things over the years. I've don't know that I've ever met anyone who had done things as terrible as him while being both unrepentant and upfront about it. Most people can't face the terrible things they've done. They make excuses, they try to justify it. They try to convince themselves and others that they are the victim, or maybe even the hero of the story. I've never met anyone who has embraced his own . . . Evil, for lack of a better word, before. I suppose one could call it more honest, but still, I find it unnerving.

Rey didn't say anything. She understood the Kylo Ren that Hennis was seeing. It wasn't a lie, it wasn't all of who he was either. The only way Kylo knew to protect himself from his own actions was to embrace them. To hold onto the belief that if he could only give himself over completely to the Dark Side, he could finally be at peace. 

_ If you were captured by the Resistance, no one was going to make you into a sex slave._

_No, you would put me in a deep dark cell while you all argued about what to do with me. At least until some 'brave' soldier decided to kill me in my sleep._

_You could come home. Your mother wants you back._

_The son she wants back is gone. She can never forgive me._

_You don't know that._

_I know I can't ever be forgiven. That was the point of. . . _

_Of killing your father?_

Snoke had promised Kylo Ren peace. Rey believed he had only been trying to ensure that his Apprentice could never go home again. Could never believe that he could go home again.

But none of that was really Hennis' business. 

Hennis sipped their tea. "As much as I'm enjoying this. I did come here for a reason. I need to know what my client isn't telling me. Why doesn't he want you on the stand?"

"Does it matter?" Rey asked. "I'm not testifying against him, so?" she shrugged.

"It matters," Hennis disagreed. "Because I need to know if I should call you as a witness, or if he's right. The fact that Kappa didn't call you. . ."

"She can't," Rey said. "I refused to testify. So it really doesn't matter."

Hennis looked confused. "It doesn't matter if you refuse, she can call you anyway. And considering he's accused of kidnapping you twice-"

"Once," Rey corrected him. "He kidnapped me once." This was starting to wear her out. 

"The charges say twice. First at Takodonna, then at the Battle of Crait, where you killed Supreme Leader Snoke."

"He didn't kidnap me that time," Rey explained exhausted. "I surrendered, and he's the one who killed Snoke."

Hennis' eyes went wide, and then Rey remembered that everyone thought that she'd killed Snoke. When the First Order first came out and said she'd murdered the Supreme Leader, Rey had told her friends the truth; that it had been Kylo Ren, not her. But Poe had believed there was no point in correcting the First Order. It only made her, and by proxy, the Resistance, look more powerful.

He smiled at her. "Thank you, Master Jedi."

"Rey," she corrected them.

"Rey, you've set my mind at ease. I can't say I've been entirely comfortable defending Kylo Ren, but now. . ."

"Now what?" Rey asked, suddenly feeling uneasy.

"Now, I know why my client didn't want you to take the stand, and why I'm going to call on you to testify."

"You can't. I won't." Rey said.

"I told you, that's not how this works. If you're called on to testify, you have to, or you'll be held in contempt of court."

Rey swallowed. The last thing she wanted was to tell another person, especially someone she didn't know very well about her pregnancy, but she also didn't want it coming up in the trial.

"I can't because I'm pregnant, and he's the father. Kappa said I can't be called on testify if I don't want to." Seeing the look on Hennis' face, she quickly added. "And no, he didn't hurt me." 

"Oh." For a moment, Hennis looked entirely out of words. Then they gathered themselves together. "Does he know?"

"Yes, but no one else does, other than Kappa." She hoped she didn't have to explain that.

Hennis thought a moment and nodded. "I'm sorry, Rey, that's not how this works. You can’t be called on to testify _against_ him. But I’m calling on you to testify _for_ him. You can't actually say no to that."

"What? That makes no sense."

"Welcome to the law," Hennis said. "But you will have a few days. There's even a microscopic chance that I'll get the whole case thrown out before you get a chance to testify. So you can hope for that. Goodnight, Rey."  


* * *

  
**Garnik V 15 days after the crash**

"There, like that," he whispered in her ear, his large hands pulling her hips into position. "That will give you a more stable base and make it harder for an opponent to knock you over."

"I'm not the unstable one," she couldn't help but joke.

"Are you going to take this seriously or not?" he asked, annoyed.

"Every time we've fought, I've won," she reminded him. "So, why do I want you to train me again?"

"Because when we fought on Starkiller, I was off-balance," he told her. "You could never take me at my full strength."

Once, she might have agreed with that. She knew she'd been lucky at Starkiller, that Chewie had done a lot of the work for her injuring Kylo before they fought. But that had also been months ago. She'd stood up to Snoke since then, she'd built her own lightsaber. She was no longer a scared girl running from destiny.

"If that's true, which it's not," she added. "Why make me better? Why help me learn how to defeat you?"

She knew right away that he had an answer, but that it wasn't one he was willing to share. When he spoke, it wasn't exactly a lie, but it was certainly not the first truth that had come to his mind.

He let go over her hips and stood in front of her. "Because we should always strive for perfection. This makes me better, as well."

"I don't like perfection," Rey said without thinking. "Things that are perfect, those are things that you have to trade away that you can't keep. All my treasures have always been slightly used, slightly battered." She thought about her old Rebel helmet, her broken down At-At, and her stubborn little flower that refused to die. The things that had actually been hers and not given to her by the Resistance. "But at least they were mine."

Without thinking, she reached up, and her fingers traced the scar she had left on his face.

"You're right," he said sadly, holding her eyes with his. "What is perfect can't be kept, but. . . I don't know how to stop trying. If I stop, then what was the point in any of it?"

"I used to think like that," she told him. "I've waited all those days for my parents to come back, I'd tell myself. If I leave now, then doesn't it mean I've waisted all that time? I just have to keep on waiting so it will mean something. But it didn't. It was pointless, and I wasted years all because I wasn't brave enough to admit I'd made a mistake. To find a new path."

He pulled away from her touch, anger filling his eyes. She couldn't tell if he was angry at her or at himself.

"Sometimes you can't turn back," he told her, pulling away. "Some choices can never be undone."

"No choice can be undone," Rey said, reaching for him, not wanting to let him pull away from her. "But we can make a different one today, and the next day, and the next."

It didn't work. He was done with this conversation. He had now moved out of her reach. "I should go fishing before it gets too late," was all he said before he turned to walk away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The snippet of conversation Rey remembers is from the very first chapters, although I extended the conversation a little longer here.
> 
> I thought I was going to be putting up a final chapter this week. But after trying to write the closing arguments yesterday I went back over what I had written and realized that Hennis' defense was organized by how I came up with the ideas, and not how it made sense to present it. So I'm going back and rewriting the last several chapters. Probably this won't affect me posting next week, but I'm not sure. Because I need to go back and do a lot of the re-writing before I can be sure which version tells the better story.


	17. A Jedi Knight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Leia takes the stand. Rey and Kylo start to make a plan to get off of Garnik V

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for all your kudos and comments. I do promise, Rey's testimony is coming, just not quite yet. Also, I'll only have one update this weekend, but it's a long chapter.
> 
> Also full disclosure, I haven't seen the prequels since they first came out. Here's what I remember for either Episode I or II: Obi-Wan and Qin-Gon Jinn go on a highspeed chase through Coruscant end up in a bar, and one of them cuts off a guys arm with a lightsaber. Then, later on, they go hang out with a bunch of Senators and no one worries about whether or not there would be any questions as to appropriate use of force. This is what I've based by ideas of the legal status of Jedi in the Old Republic on. If I have misremembered I apologize.

“Your Honor,” Hennis started the day. “I’d like to call Senator Leia Organa to the stand.”

“Objection,” Kappa said. “The Senator has been in the courtroom for most of the trial. If the Defense intended to call her as a witness, we should have been informed.”

“Your Honor,” Hennis argued. “At the start of this trial, she was a co-defendant, so she had every right to be here. Also, I am calling her as an expert witness, so her testimony shouldn’t be tainted.”

“An expert on what?” Judge Sato asked.

“Jedi law and history, your Honor,” Hennis explained.

The Judge considered for a moment, then nodded. “I’ll allow it, but tread carefully.”

“Always, Your Honor.”

Leia rose calmly and took the stand. Her demeanor was calm, collected, and maybe slightly amused. Even so, Rey noticed that the General didn’t look directly at her son while she was sworn in.

“To begin with, Senator,” Hennis said. “I’d like to establish the scope of your knowledge. You were part of the first Senate of the New Republic, and helped write the New Republic constitution, is that correct?”

“Yes, it is.” Leia’s said simply.

“You are also an expert on the Jedi, are you not?”

Leia smiled, “I suspect somewhere there’s some academic who has studied a great deal more about Jedi history than I have, but you’re probably right, few living people know as much about the Jedi as I do.”

“Because you have known several of them correct? How many Jedi have you known?”

“That’s not as straightforward a question as you might think.”

“How so?” 

“I met Master Obi-Wan Kenobi only once shortly before his death, although he was a great friend of my father, and I grew up hearing many stories about him. Of course, my brother Master Luke Skywalker I knew very well. There is, of course, now Rey. As for Anakin Skywalker. . . I met the man he became, but I wouldn’t say I knew him.”

“I’m sorry, Senator. By Anakin Skywalker, you mean your father? Darth Vader? I thought you said he and Obi-wan Kenobi were friends?”

Leia’s face darkened, and her tone shifted from amicable to what Rey could only describe as even. As if the older woman was trying to strip all emotion from her voice.

“Let me clarify something. When I say ‘my father,’ I always mean Bail Organa. He was my father, he raised me, he made me who I am today. I won’t deny my biological connection to Darth Vader, but he was never my father. He was the man who killed my parents along with my entire planet.”

“Thank you for clarifying, Senator,” Hennis said, sounding for the moment a little meeker than usual. “What about your son? Ben Solo? He trained as a Jedi, yes? Did he finish that training?”

Leia paused for a minute, then nodded. “Yes, he achieved the rank of Jedi Knight.”

“So he’s a Jedi?” Hennis asked.

Rey’s eyes darted to Kylo, expecting him to object to his own attorney’s questions, but whatever he was thinking, she couldn’t tell from his posture, and he was keeping quiet.

“I wouldn’t say that,” Leia said.

“Really?” Hennis asked. “On what grounds? How did he lose his status as Jedi?”

“I don’t know the details,” Leia said carefully. “But he and Luke fought. Ben destroyed the Jedi Temple, and left.”

“And Ben Solo was brought before the Jedi Council and stripped of his rank of Jedi Knight?” Hennis asked.

“There was no Jedi Council,” Leia said.

“That’s not exactly true, though, is it?” Hennis asked. “The New Republic Senate, in Resolution 23 confirmed Luke Skywalker’s legal status as a Jedi, and charged him with heading up the Jedi Council until such time as the Jedi Order could be reestablished, isn’t that correct?”

“Yes,” Leia nodded. 

“So it was his responsibility to govern Jedi affairs, was it not?”

“Yes.”

“And in that official capacity, did he make Ben Solo a Jedi?”

“Yes.”

“And did he later revoke that title as was his right as head of the Jedi Council?”

“No,” Leia acknowledged.

“And just so we are absolutely clear, the title of Jedi confers special legal privileges under the New Republic Constitution, does it not?”

“Technically, the legal privileges were granted to the Jedi under the Old Republic but were assumed under common law in the New Republic constitution. The adoption of the laws was formalized with Resolution 23. 

“So, the Jedi do have special legal privileges?” Hennis clarified.

“Yes, they do,” Leia agreed.

“So when Luke Skywalker made Ben Solo a Jedi, he gave him those legal privileges, and he never saw it necessary to revoke them?”

“I don’t know what he thought was necessary, but no, I don’t think he ever moved too formally revoke them.”

Rey was amazed at how calmly Leia was able to answer. If she was annoyed or exhausted by the repeated questions, she didn’t let on.

“So, Ben Solo is, in fact, a Jedi, is he not?”

“Legally, yes, it seems he is,” Leia admitted.

“When a Jedi is accused of a crime, who are they supposed to be turned over to.”

Leia sighed. “The Jedi Council.”

“And what happens then?”

“The Council makes its own determination as to the Jedi’s guilt or innocence. If they find the Jedi guilty, they may hand them over to local authorities for punishment, or they may choose to punish the Jedi themselves.”

“To you’re knowledge, how many living Jedi are there?”

“Just R-Master Rey,” Leia corrected herself. 

“And Ben Solo?” Hennis insisted.

“Yes, I suppose legally him as well.”

“Since Master Skywalker is dead, would Master Rey be considered a member of the Jedi Council?”

“Yeah, I suppose so. With Luke gone, I suppose Rey does now represent the Jedi Council.”

“And to the best of your knowledge, Senator, was Ben Solo ever given into Master Rey’s custody so that she could determine whether or not he would stand trial?”

“No, I don’t believe so.”

“So this trial is circumventing the rights of the Jedi Council to deliberate on the actions of its members?”

“Yes, I suppose it is,” Leia looked almost amused.

“And in your expert opinion as a former legislator, and one of the people who helped write the New Republic constitution, is this trail lawful?”

Before Leia could answer, the Judge slammed down his gavel loudly. 

“That is enough,” the Judge slammed down his gavel. “The jury will disregard that last question. I will not have you questioning the legality of this court.”

“My apologies, Your Honor,” Hennis said, but there was just a hint of annoyance in the usually calm attorney’s voice.

It took a moment before Hennis was ready with another question.

“Are there any specific laws governing the use of the Force?” 

“A few yes,” Leia agreed. “Some Force abilities are considered to belong entirely to the Dark Side, and such are considered unlawful. But a Jedi is never supposed to use the Force arbitrarily. It should only be used when necessary, and with pure intent.”

“And is mind-reading on that list of illegal Force abilities?”

“The Jedi wouldn’t call it mind-reading,” Leia responded. “Anyone who is Force-sensitive has some level of empathic abilities and can sense strong emotions in others. Blocking that out completely is actually quite difficult, so there’s no specific prohibition against it.”

“What about using the Force to extract information from someone? Is that allowed?”

“Not in all forms. There are some versions that could potentially leave the person whose mind is being read comatose. That would, I believe, always be forbidden. But in the right circumstances, if the need were great enough, yes, it would be allowed. The use of an ability like that would always be considered preferable to physical violence.”

“So for instance, if it was imperative that a powerful Jedi, say Luke Skywalker needed to be found, it would be acceptable under Jedi law to use such an ability to extract the map?”

“Objection,” Kappa stood up. “Calls for speculation.”

The Judge considered for a moment, then grudgingly said, “Overruled. But the witness will only answer as to what is specified in Jedi law.”

“Specifically, Your Honor?” Leia said with just the hint of a smile. “Such an action would require review by the Jedi Council to determine if it were lawful or not. ”

The Judge glared at Leia.

And Rey suddenly wondered if Leia was trying to help her son. She knew what had been done to Poe, and it hadn’t been pleasant. But Leia was subtly making an argument that it wasn’t the court’s place to judge this action.

Suddenly Rey wondered what she would do if it was given to her to judge Kylo Ren. What would she do with him? She wouldn’t execute him, but what then? What sort of punishment was right for him?

She thought back to her conversation with Hennis the night before. Reformation, that seemed like the Jedi way, not punishment for the sake of punishment or revenge. The only problem was, Rey had no idea how to reform Kylo Ren.

Hennis continued like this for a little longer. Asking questions about whether the Jedi were allowed to detain people for questioning whether they could use Force, including deadly force. Much to the Judge’s annoyance, the answers Leia gave were much the same. The Jedi had broad powers to act both as a military and police Force in the Old Republic, and it was only the Jedi Council that had authority to determine if they had acted lawfully or not.

Finally, Kappa was given her turn to cross-examine Leia.

“Earlier you were asked about Senate Resolution 23, in which Luke Skywalker was formally recognized as head of The Jedi Council, and given the same legal rights and responsibility’s as the Jedi of the Old Republic.

“Is it not also true, Senator, that you were the only person to vote against Resolution 23?”

“Objection,” Hennis stood up. “It’s of no importance whether the Senator agrees with the law or not, only that it is law.”

“Overruled,” the Judge said without hesitation.

“Your Honor. . .” Hennis was cut off before they could get any further.

“If you’re going to question the validity of this court, it seems to me the Prosecution has the right to question that law.”

Unhappily Hennis sat down.

“Yes,” Leia said without further prompting. “I voted against it, and as I recall, I was the only dissenting vote.”

“Why?” Kappas asked.

“Ben was two,” Leia said simply as if that answered everything. 

The silence that followed made her realized she had to explain more. 

“The Jedi believed the ideal age for a human child to begin their training was four years old. They rarely trained children any older. And where did they get these four-year-olds from? They took them. They took them from their mothers, often when they were even younger, precisely so they wouldn’t remember their parents. So they wouldn’t have any attachments.

“I always knew Ben was Force-sensitive, and so did Luke. From the beginning, Luke wanted to train him, but. . . I didn’t want to give up my son. He was just a baby. He had his whole life ahead of him. He could have been anyone, anything he wanted. I wasn’t willing to decide his whole future in that moment. And the Jedi had the authority to take any Force-Sensitive child they wanted for training.

“So there I was in the Senate, being asked to vote to give someone else the authority to take my son from me at any time they wanted. My baby boy.”

Rey could see Kylo’s shoulder’s tense, but and she couldn’t help but want to hit him and yell at him and remind her just how much his family had loved him.

“I knew Luke would never do it. He had too much sense to try and force me to give up my son. I think he knew that, brother or not, I would have hunted him down across the Galaxy to get my son back. But I didn’t believe he should have that power. What about the Jedi who would come after him? What about the mothers who would have their children taken from them, with no legal recourse? How could I vote for that?”

“Was that the only reason you voted against it?” Kappa asked.

“No, and yes. You see, for a while during the Rebellion, I also considered training to be a Jedi. Or rather, I did train for a while, but then. . . Well, Luke and I learned more about the Jedi, specifically Anakin, and our mother. They were married in secret, because a Jedi is supposed to feel Compassion, but not Love. Marriage was a crime to the Jedi.”

“By then, I knew I wanted a future with Han. Nothing the Jedi could offer me was more important than that. Luke saw it differently. But he was still young. I hated thinking my brother had already given up on the possibility that he would ever know love. 

“So no, I didn’t want that life for my brother, or my son. And I didn’t think the New Republic should simply accept that everything the Jedi had done was right.”

“Did you change your mind?” Kappa asked. “Your son did eventually train with Skywalker.”

“Obviously, I changed my mind about sending my son to train with Luke, but not about Jedi Law.”

“So you believe that the Jedi deserve no special acceptions under the law but should be treated like everyone else?”

“It’s not that simple,” Leia said. “Force-Sensitive’s can do things other people can’t, including subverting the will of others. There has to be some system to regulate that, but also, they need to be protected. The Jedi judged their own for a reason. There were incidents of unexplained events being blamed on Force-sensitives, whether they were responsible or not. It’s easy to say the Jedi made me do it, and hard for anyone other than another Force-sensitive to prove whether the accusation is true or not.

“Like all things, some of it is good, and some bad. I voted against Resolution 23 because it formalized the acceptance of all Jedi Law, without the potential for the New Republic to rule on individual cases as they came up, in the same way, other laws from the Old Republic and Empire were being scrutinized.

“That’s all very well and good, Senator. But do you think the Jedi should be held accountable under the law the same as any other citizen?”

Leia paused, and for the first time since the cross-examination had begun, she let herself really look at her son. She said nothing as her eyes found his. 

“Senator?” Kappa prompted when Leia didn’t respond.

“No,” Leia finally said. “I don’t think a Jedi should be held accountable in the same way. They should be judged by other Jedi.”

“And yet you were willing to vote against the Jedi having those rights?”

Leia shrugged. “Yes, I was. It seemed less important at the time.”

Kappa nodded a little unhappily. Clearly, this line of questioning hadn’t gone the way she had hoped.

“Earlier, you didn’t count your son among the Jedi you have known,” Kappa continued. “Do you consider your son a Jedi?”

“Objection, Your Honor,” Hennis spoke up. “She has already acknowledged that Ben Solo is a Jedi.”

“I’m asking for her expert opinion, Your Honor,” Kappa countered.

“Overruled,” the Judge agreed and nodded towards Leia.

“No, I don’t,” Leia admitted.

“Why not?” Kappa prompted.

“He destroyed the Jedi temple for one,” Leia said wryly.

“Objection, speculation,” Hennis said.

“Do you have direct knowledge of those events?” the Judge asked Leia.

“Only what little Luke told me,” Leia admitted.

“Sustained,” the Judge agreed with Hennis.

As Hennis sat back down, Rey could see Kylo whisper something to his attorney, Hennis nodded. But Kappa continued her questioning.

“Do you have any other reasons for not considering Kylo Ren, a Jedi?” 

“He’s embraced the Dark Side,” Leia said firmly. “That is very much against Jedi Law.”

Kappa’s questions became more technical after that. Picking at many of the arguments that Hennis had made, asking for clarification on a variety of points.

Finally, as she was wrapping up, she asked, “You helped put together this trial, didn’t you?”

“When Kylo Ren was captured, I put Commander Dameron in touch with members of the Senate, yes.”

“And did you ever recommend that he first be judged by Master Rey?”

“No, I didn’t.”

“Is that because you were trying to sabotage these proceedings to protect your son?”

Leia’s eyes flared at the accusation. “No, I did everything I could to stay out of the arrangements once it had been set in motion, precisely because . . . Because I’m not impartial.”

Kappa nodded. “Well, on that we can agree. No further questions, Your Honor.”

Before Leia could step down, Hennis rose. “Redirect, Your Honor?”

“Go ahead,” the Judge agreed.

“You said, your brother, Luke Skywalker, told you that your son Ben Solo destroyed the Jedi temple, is that correct?”

“Yes, it is.”

“And what did Master Luke Skywalker do about it?”

Leia hesitated for a moment then said a little sadly, “Nothing, he disappeared.”

“Did he make sure that Ben Solo was brought before the Jedi Council and stripped of his rank of Jedi Knight?” Hennis asked.

“There was no Jedi Council,” Leia said.

“That’s not exactly true, though, is it?” Hennis asked. “The New Republic Senate in declaration 23 confirmed Luke Skywalker’s status as a Jedi, and charged him with heading up the Jedi Council until such time as the Jedi Order could be reestablished, isn’t that correct?”

“Yes,” Leia nodded. 

“So it was his responsibility to govern Jedi affairs, was it not?”

“Yes.”

“And in that official capacity, did he make Ben Solo a Jedi?”

“Yes.”

“And did he later revoke that title as was his right as head of the Jedi Council?”

“No,” Leia acknowledged.

Hennis’ voice seemed to soften for a moment. “Was Luke Skywalker aware that your biological father, Anakin Skywalker, was a Jedi?”

Leia seemed to stiffen at Anakin Skywalker’s name. “Yes, of course.”

“Was he also aware that Anakin Skywalker turned against the Jedi and when Order 66 was given?”

“Yes.”

“And that he then became Darth Vader?”

“Yes, of course, he knew.”

“So, he was fully aware of the harm a rogue Jedi could do?”

“He knew,” Leia admitted, starting to become annoyed.

“But he did nothing. He didn’t warn anyone? He made no attempt to capture Ben Solo?”

“No, I told you, he just disappeared.”

“But as a Jedi, it was his duty to protect the New Republic, was it not? If Ben Solo was a threat, was a rogue Jedi, wasn’t it Luke Skywalker’s duty to stop him?”

“It’s not that simple, they were-“

“Yes, or no,” Hennis interrupted Leia. “Was Master Luke Skywalker entrusted with a duty by the New Republic Senate to protect the New Republic, and did that duty includes protecting the New Republic from any rogue force users?”

“Yes,” Leia retorted. “Yes, he had a duty. We trusted him, and he. . . He just left, and he didn’t tell us why.”

For a moment, Leia’s face was pained, then she closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and just like that, she was the calm General, Princess, and Senator once again.

“Is it possible that it wasn’t Ben Solo who destroyed the temple?”

“I’m sorry?” Leia said, surprised by the question.

“I asked is it possible that Ben Solo wasn’t responsible for the destruction of the temple, that it was Luke Skywalker.”

“Luke loved the temple, he would never-”

“So, it’s not possible?” Hennis cut her off. “There is no chance that Luke Skywalker attacked one of his students? That Ben Solo was was only acting in self-defense?”

“Luke wouldn’t hurt his students.” Leia objected. “The students were all killed.”

“And you believe your son responsible?” Hennis asked.

“Yes,”

“Because Luke Skywalker told you so?”

“Yes.”

“Before he disappeared without making any attempt to stop Ben Solo?”

“Objection asked and answered.” Kappa stood up.

“Withdrawn,” Hennis agreed.

“You don’t believe Luke Skywalker was capable of hurting his students, but before he told you Ben Solo was responsible, did you believe your son was capable of such an act?”

“No,” Leia admitted, her composure starting to crack.

“Were you ever presented with any evidence that it was your son responsible?”

“Evidence, no.”

“Did Luke ever give any reasons for why Ben Solo would suddenly attack the other students?”

“No, he didn’t say.”

“And you didn’t ask?” Hennis pressed.

“I didn’t actually talk to him. I got a message from him saying that Ben had turned to the Dark Side and killed all the students. By the time I arrived at the temple, Luke was gone. I never got a chance to ask him what happened.”

“So your brother accused your son of murder, and then fled the Galaxy so that he couldn’t be further questioned about what happened?”

“That’s one way of putting it.”

“Yes, or no, Senator?” Hennis insisted.

“Yes, he accused Ben of murder, and then he disappeared.”

“Much like a guilty man might have done?”

“Objection, call for speculation,” Kappa rose.

Hennis smiled and nodded. “Withdrawn.”

* * *

**Garnik V 31 days after the crash**

Rey was starting to get worried. Kylo had been underwater for a long time. That, of course, was the point of the raft, so he could get far out from the shore without wearing himself out, leaving him the strength to dive far below the ocean to search for their ships. 

It still seemed like a ridiculous idea to her. The ocean was pretty damn big, after all. Except now that he had convinced her to come out on the raft, she had to admit to something. She could feel it. Somewhere below her was something metal and man-made, and not part of this planet. Something whose force signature didn’t match everything around her.

But that didn’t do anyone any good if the ships were so deep that you drowned trying to get to them.

Suddenly the surface of the water broke as Kylo’s head breached the surface of the ocean. She watched for a moment while eyes closed, he pushed back his wet hair, before she grabbed the oar and directed the raft towards him. That’s why she was here, to make sure the raft didn’t drift too far from him, or to at least bring it over if it did.

“Are we done?” she asked somewhat hopefully. One lesson in floating had not made her a fan of the ocean. It was still very big, and there were still fish in it.

He grinned broadly at her, leaning on the raft, but not pulling himself up. “Done?! I found it. You’re ship, it’s down there.”

“Great,” she said less than enthusiastically. “But we’re up here. And I doubt it will fly.”

“It doesn’t need to fly,” he told her. “I just need you to concentrate.”

“I don’t know what that means,” she told him.

“Look, I can go down and see the ship, but it’s difficult to concentrate enough to lift it with the Force while swimming underwater. Which,” he continued before she could interrupt. “is why you’re going to be the one to lift it out of the ocean.”

“I can’t do that if I can’t see it,” she argued. “Like you said, concentration.”

“You’ll see it through my eyes,” he told her. “If I open myself up to you completely, you should be able to see thought my eyes.”

“Is that possible?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” he admitted. “But that’s because there’s not much information on Force bonds like ours. I don’t see why it shouldn’t be.”

The idea made her uncomfortable. What exactly did it mean for Kylo to open himself up completely to her? And what if it still distracted him, and he drowned, and she was stuck in his head as he did so?

“Okay, well, maybe we don’t practice in the middle of the ocean then,” she said. “Maybe we should test this theory of yours out first. You know, where no one can drown.”

“But-“

She shook her head. “No,” she said firmly. “I’m not risking you drowning and leaving me all alone on this planet.”

He signed, but nodded and pulled himself up onto the raft. He kissed the top of Rey's head. “You don’t need to worry, Rey. I’m not leaving you.”

She knew he meant it. And that was what made it hurt so much. He didn’t seem to understand the one thing she was sure of. This thing, whatever it was, it only worked here on this planet. Once they escaped, once they were back in the rest of the Galaxy, they would be Supreme Leader Kylo Ren and Jedi Rey again. And this would be over.


	18. Meditation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kylo begins to instruct Rey on new Force tecniques, Hennis presents new evidence.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for all the Kudos and comments. Massive re-writing has put me a bit behind on my schedule. Hopefully, I'll be back on track soon and can post twice a week again. I have a certain place I want to get to before TROS, and I don't think 1 chapter a week will get me there.

**Garnik V 32 days after the crash**

Rey settled into a meditative pose. At first, she was vibrantly aware of the world around here. Garnik V was a vital living planet, and the Force was a secure web of connections between all the living things on the planet.

But bit by bit, she shut all of it out, letting herself sink deeper and deeper into herself until everything external disappeared around her. There in the stillness that was herself self, there was only one thing, a red thread that emanated outward from the core of her being.

She followed it, knowing exactly where it would take her; to Kylo.

It took longer than she thought it should. Or maybe it didn’t. It was hard to know. Some part of her was aware that he was less than a meter away from her, but part of her had no real conception of space now that she had left her body.

And then she opened her eyes.

Except they weren’t her eyes. 

They were his. 

Kylo Ren opened his eyes and looked on Rey, where she sat meditating. No, she realized his eyes had been open, he had been watching her.

She looked still, serene, and Rey suddenly had the urge to reach out and touch the Rey in front of her. If she touched the physical Rey’s cheek, would it both feel like it was her hand and her cheek?

But nothing happened.

**Are you there?** Kylo asked her.

Rey didn’t know where there was. **I am here.**

That she was sure was true. Where could you possibly be after all, but here? You were always here. That’s where here was.

**Well?** He was impatient, his gaze shifted so that he was looking at a pile of small rocks that sat between them.

She remembered then why she was here. She was in Kylo Ren, or maybe she was in herself. She was here after all, wherever here was, but she was looking through Kylo’s eyes. 

She reached out with the Force, and the rocks started to move, to lift. She could feel her lips, no Kylo’s lips form a smile. The sensation startled her so much that she dropped the rocks, and just like that, the connection was gone.

“Damn it!” Rey said as she snapped back into her own body.

“That was amazing,” Kylo said at almost the same moment. 

“What are you talking about?” Rey asked, annoyed. “The idea is for me to lift a ship off of the seafloor using your eyes while you are swimming underwater. You smiled, and it distracted me so much. I lost all concentration. How am I going to do this while you’re swimming?”

“Rey,” he said, half incredulous, half annoyed. “No one has done this before, or if they have, it’s never been recorded. I mean, it’s a little like Battle Meditation, but on a smaller scale.”

“So it’s smaller than something that any real Jedi could do called Battle Meditation, but not as big a deal, and oh, by the way, I can’t do it.”

“You know, moments like this, I wish my Uncle wasn’t dead, so I could kill him. Very few Jedi or Sith, for that matter, were able to use Battle Meditation. It’s a difficult and rare skill. I’ve never seen it. And I didn’t say this was easier, I just said it’s a smaller scale because you’re just trying to coordinate with me, not an entire army. Still, maybe if I teach you what I know about Battle Meditation. . .”

“You really won’t let go of this teacher thing, will you?” she said, half teasing. The truth was she desperately longed to learn, she just didn’t know if it was right for her to learn these things from him.

But what choice did she have? She did want to leave this planet, even if he often doubted that. 

“Fine,” she agreed. “Battle Mediation. Tell me whatever it is, you know.”

* * *

After Leia finished her testimony and took her seat, Hennis presented a holovid as evidence.

It was not the first time a holovid had been introduced as evidence in the trial. But none of those had elicited quite the response this one did in its first few seconds. No one had expected to see the command center of Starkiller base laid out for them.

“Objection, Your Honor," Kappa said before even a minute had passed. "How did the Defense get this recording, and what proof do we have that it is accurate?"

"A good question. Well?" The Judge turned to Hennis.

"Your Honor," Hennis began. "I am more than happy to let the Prosecution examine the video to their heart's content. As for how I obtained it. I would have been derelict in my duties if I had not tried to find evidence of who was actually behind the Hosnian Cataclysm."

"You've been in touch with the First Order?" Kappa asked.

Hennis shrugged. "I'm surprised you weren't. So far, all the Prosecution has provided is circumstantial evidence linking my client to the destruction of the Hosnian system. Yes, he was part of the First Order, and yes, he did have a position of authority, but he was not directly in the military chain of command. Nor was he present at Starkiller base when the order was given. This video will prove that the Hosnian Cataclysm was carried out entirely by the military branch of the First Order."

"You can't have it both ways, Hennis," Kappa objected. "Either Kylo Ren is fighting a war and is part of the military, or he is a criminal and a murderer."

"Objection, Your Honor," Hennis said. "I would ask the Prosecution to save any such comments until their closing arguments, and that it be struck from the record. Their opinion has nothing to do with the validity of this evidence."

"Sustained," the Judge said. "But I'm concerned that you are secretly communicating with the First Order. How did you get this? You may have compromised all our security."

"You're Honor, there is nothing secret about it," Hennis objected. "Commander Dameron was well aware of all of this, and considering these proceedings are being broadcast, it would seem inappropriate to me to discuss the security precautions that were taken to allow me to obtain this."

"Commander Dameron has seen this?" the Judge asked. 

"No, Your Honor," Hennis explained. "As he has been a witness, in this case, it would be inappropriate to show him evidence for the trial, but he did have his best technician, a Commander Tycho, examine the holovids and make sure they had not been tampered with."

The Judge considered for several seconds. "All right then, I suppose we must allow it."

The holovid was started up again, and once more, the command deck of Starkiller base appeared. For a moment, little of interest seemed to be happening; it was merely officers sitting at their panels. Then General Hux entered the room.

"Mitaka," the General called out. Another officer leapt to attention. "The Supreme Leader has given the order. We are finally going to show the Galaxy what we have built. Here's our target," Hux handed over a holo pad.

'The Hosnian system?" Mitaka asked.

Hux nodded. It was hard to tell from the holovid, but he might have been smiling. "The Senate has aided the Resistance for too long. I will be speaking to the troops once the weapon is primed. I will give you the signal to fire."

With that, the holovid ended, but Hennis had a second recording queued up. 

Hux stood at a podium, the banner of the First Order hanging behind him. "Today is the end of the Republic The end of a regime that acquiesces to disorder! At this very moment in a system far from here, the New Republic lies to the Galaxy while secretly supporting the treachery of the loathsome Resistance. This fierce machine which you have built, upon which we stand, will bring an end to the Senate! To their cherished fleet! All remaining systems will bow to the First Order! And will remember this... as the last day of the Republic!"

A moment passes, and then a strange light reflected and flickered across the General's face.

There was nothing else that needed to be seen. Everyone in the courtroom knew what the light was, knew how it ended. It was that light that snuffed out billions of lives.

And for a few moments, there was only silence.

Next to her, Rey could feel Leia tremble slightly.

Finally Hennis spoke again breaking the silence, "Your Honor, in light of this evidence, which clearly shows that the Hosnian system was destroyed under the command of Supreme Leader Snoke, and carried about by a General Armitage Hux, I would like all the charges related to the Hosnian Cataclysm against my client dropped."

"No," the Judge's voice trembled.

And then Rey felt it, the swirling darkness and pain that surrounded the Judge, Dorn Sato. She hadn't given much thought to him up to this point. He was meant to be an impartial arbitrator of the trial. But suddenly, she was reminded that he was from the Hosnian system. He had been off-world when the Cataclysm occurred, and so he'd been spared.

He had been chosen precisely because he was from the world that had suffered the most. But that also meant he had suffered the most. In any other case, for any other crime, Rey could see the wisdom of having a Judge who was from the affected planet. But in this case, anyone from the Hosnian system was also a victim of the crime.

And the Judge's emotions were suddenly so strong that Rey couldn't help but be viscerally aware of them. Everyone he loved, everyone he had know was dead. Not even the places remained. There were no ruins to his home, only dust floating in space.

He had suffered an unfathomable tragedy. And perhaps it was some sign of the strength of his will that she had not felt until now the deep despair that coursed through him, that threatened to crush him underneath.

"Your Honor," Hennis started, but he was interrupted by the gavel right away. 

"I said, no," Judge Sato repeated. "The trial continues. The First Order destroyed an entire system. Someone must be held responsible. I want proof these recordings are real."

"Your Honor," this time, it was Kappa who started to object.

Again Sato slammed down the gavel. "Enough. Court is in recess for the rest of the day."

This time people did begin to murmur as the court emptied out. Rey was going to ask Leia a question, but as she looked over, she realized tears were quietly running down the older woman's face.

"Leia?" Rey asked tentatively. She had never actually addressed the General by her first name alone, but at the moment, it felt right.

Something that was almost a smile graced Leia's face. "It wasn't him," she said softly. "It wasn't my son." Leia reached out and suddenly grabbed Rey's hand and squeezed.

Whether she had meant it or not, Rey felt Leia's relief wash over her. Her son hadn't murdered billions of people, and until that moment, Leia hadn't let her self hope that was true. It didn't make Kylo Ren a good person, but it meant he wasn't the worst sort of monster.

For a moment, it was too much for Rey, all she could do was hold the other woman's hand, at a loss of what to say.

The court had basically emptied at this point, and finally, Rey spoke. "He's not terrible." It seemed like such a silly and inadequate thing to say. "I mean if things were different. . ."

If things were different, what? She didn't know the end to that sentence. For a second, she thought about telling Leia about the pregnancy. But what would be the point in that? If things were different, she and Ben Solo would be a happy family? That was, at best, a silly and unrealistic fantasy. 

"They're not different," Leia seemed to finish the thought for her. "But they are better than I thought I could hope for."

They sat like that, the two women alone in the courtroom for a few more minutes, letting the silence comfortably pass between them. 

"I should clean up," Leia said at last before she got up and left Rey alone in the courtroom.

It was a strange feeling. The room felt hollow, almost haunted without anyone else in it. As if it had been drained of purpose. 

And Rey couldn't help but wonder if it was her imagination or something else entirely. She sat down on the floor in a meditative pose, closed her eyes, and reached out. 

She hadn't she realized meditated since leaving Garnik V. Which also meant she hadn't done it, without Kylo there to guide her.

Garnik V had been wild. Other than her Kylo and their ships, everything on that planet had evolved there, been part of that plant since it's creation.

But now she sat in an artificial room, on a moon that was almost lifeless except for what the Resistance had brought with it.

And yet the Force was here too. It was here just as it was everywhere. It was in the tables and the benches, the walls, and the floor.

She understood now the haunted feeling she had experienced, the emotions that had raged in this room just a little while ago had been intense enough to leave a phantom trace that was slowly dissipating. 

The Judge's immeasurable grief that Rey now realized was a scar in his own Force signature, where he'd been ripped away from all the invisible connections he'd had over his life.

A similar Force scar she now realized Leia also bore, that had opened up a little again today, but also perhaps healed a little. The place where her connection to Alderaan had been.

There was also ambition, fear, anger, hatred, and doubt. Ghost of emotion that belonged to everyone else, and to no one in particular.

And in that doubt, Rey began to find her own confidence. She was no longer just sensing the leftover emotions that hung in the room. She was reaching out in something almost like Battle Meditation to feel like one the emotions of everyone on the base.

Everywhere she felt doubt and uncertainty, and Rey suddenly understood that she wasn't alone. That no one else here was sure about what was happening. No one was in control, no one knew what to do next. 

And in their doubt, Rey suddenly found her own confidence. She wanted to reach out, to soothe their fear, to let them know they weren't alone. That as individuals, they might fail, but together they would come to the right decision.

"Ow!" Rey gasped as something collided with her, pulling her out of her trance.

"Maker, I'm sorry!" Kappa, who had tripped over Rey, exclaimed. "I didn't- why are you sitting on the floor?"

Rey blushed. She supposed it must have looked strange sitting on the ground in between the rows of seats just behind the low wall that separated the attorneys from the rest of the court.

No wonder Kappa hadn't seen her.

"I, uh, was meditating," Rey admitted a little shyly.

Kappa had begun to reach out a hand to help up Rey, then paused, but Rey took her hand anyway.

Still sensitive to the emotions around her, Rey realized that Kappa was upset. Or maybe she didn't really need the Force to know that. The woman was clearly flustered.

"Is everything all right?" Rey asked.

Kappa sighed. 

"You know I want this to be a fair trial, right?" the question seemed rhetorical. "And not just because I don't want to lose on appeal. But how am I supposed to. . ."

Rey smiled encouragingly. Whatever was upsetting other women, Rey suspected that she wasn't looking for any kind of direct answer, just someone to listen.

"I can't pursue the death penalty, at least not for the Hosnian System. He's probably still an accessory, but the Judge refuses to let me change the charge. Not that I'm going to go easy on him, but it wouldn't be right. . . He still needs to pay for what he's done but. . ."

Kappa's voice trailed off. It was strange hearing her like this when every word wasn't planned and prepared. 

Rey didn't understand all of it, but she figured she didn't need to. If she had lost some of the clarity, she'd had a moment ago, one thing had become clear to her. She finally understood the purpose of the trial. One person couldn't come to the right decision, but as a group together, perhaps they could do the right thing.

"Thank you," Rey said. "For wanting to be fair. And if it makes you feel any better, I'll be testifying after all, so that might help you out."

Kappa laughed in amazement. "You know I had my doubts about you, Master Rey, but I see it now. I don't know how you can be this nice to me after, I'm sorry after I violated your privacy."

"I grew up on a planet where people might stab you in the street for your rations, it's hardly the worst thing that's ever happened to me." 

"I'd like to think I hold myself to a higher moral standard than, is this better or worse than stabbing someone?" Kappa joked. "But on that note, if you are going to testify. . . The last thing I want to do is ambush you. There's something you should see."

Rey watched curiously as Kappa took out her holopad and brought up an image.

Rey's curiosity turned to shock as the image of a woman, and a man appeared.

"Where did you get these?" Rey demanded having lost any sense of calm in an instant.

"So these are your parents then?" Kappa confirmed.

Rey could only nod, as she suddenly found herself struggling not to cry.

"Hennis isn't the only one who's done some investigating since this trial began."

"I don't understand," Rey said, still in shock from seeing her parent's faces after all this time. "What do they have to do with any of this?"

Were her parents somehow involved with the First Order? A hundred questions Rey had thought she finally had put behind her suddenly came back.

"Nothing, except that your mother was born on Coruscant, which means that despite growing up on Jakku, you are a citizen of the New Republic. I can't let Hennis win on all their jurisdiction arguments."

"Oh," Rey said. 

She should have been relieved to find out that her parents weren't part of some galactic conspiracy. But a part of her that she thought had been crushed on the Supremacy still quietly hoped that she had some grand place in the 'story' as Kylo Ren had called it. Part of her still wanted to be someone.

"I can give you everything I found on them if you'd like." Kappa offered.

For a moment, Rey considered it. She wondered what her mother had thought and felt when she'd found out she was pregnant with Rey. Had she been happy? Had she wanted a child? Or had Rey been a burden from the start?

"No, that's okay," Rey said.

It was doubtful there would be any answers in the information Kappa had, and even if there were, Rey was pretty sure she shouldn't use her own mother as any kind of guide as to what decisions Rey should make.

"Thank you," Rey said. "For not surprising me with this up to there," she nodded towards the witness stand.

"Well, I'd say thank you for testifying, but if Hennis is calling you, I suspect I'm not going to like it."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those still anxiously waiting, I promise Rey's testimony will happen next chapter.


	19. Supremacy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey testifies. Kylo had to decide how to guide her training

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I've done it. I've made it through my first draft. This will now be a 22 chapter story. That will make it through the trail. Of course, that can't wrap up everything so I'm making this a series, with the second part dealing with everything that comes after the trial.

As she had every day before this, she watched as they brought Kylo into the courtroom. It used to be he’d look at her when they brought him in. But he’d stopped doing that since she’d snuck into his cell and they’d fought. Now he made a point of looking over her head.

It wasn’t until Rey was called to the witness stand that she realized how different this day was going to be. Today she would be facing him. She had never really thought about it before, but she realized now that the witness stand was placed so the witness and the defendant could see each other.

But before she could make it there, Kylo Ren interrupted.

Since his first lawyer had been replaced, Kylo had been mostly quiet through the trial. He sometimes quietly commented on something or other to Hennis, but he had said nothing loud enough that others could hear. That ended when he realized she was being called to the stand.

“I told you not to call her,” he told Hennis as Rey started to take her place.

“I know what I’m doing,” Hennis tried to assure him.

“Your Honor,” Kylo shouted. “I won’t have her testify on my behalf.”

Rey stopped in the middle of the court, confused by the anger in his voice. Hennis had mentioned that Kylo didn’t want her to testify, but she hadn’t realized how strongly he felt.

The Judge’s gavel came down hard on the bench. “You will be silent, and Master Rey will take the stand.”

“NO!” Kylo shouted, rising up. “I won’t have her testify.”

Everything started to happen at once. As the judge ordered Kylo to sit down again, the guard who stood near his seat, tried to push him back down into his chair. But Kylo Ren was a big man. Shackled, and without the Force, it was still an easy task for him to shove the guard away so that the man stumbled back and fell.

Rey saw sudden movement from the corner of her eye. One of the other guards who stood behind the witness stand had started to pull her blaster, and Rey could feel fear radiate off of the woman. To her, Kylo wasn’t a shackled prisoner, whose powers were contained, but the most terrifying Darksider living. Rey had no doubt that in her fear, the guard was going to shoot to kill.

She moved on instinct, putting herself between Kylo and the blaster. Rey’s hand dropped to the lightsaber at her side, which she was allowed to carry in the courtroom in case she needed to subdue Kylo Ren.

The blaster fired, the lightsaber ignited, and the bolt was deflected harmlessly into the ceiling.

“Stand down,” she ordered the guard. “I’ve got this,” she said more softly.

Shocked by her display of reflexes and her willingness to put herself between a blaster and Kylo Ren, the guard nodded and put away her weapon.

Rey turned to look at Kylo and was surprised by the look of fear on his face.

“What were you thinking?” he asked with quiet horror.

Rey’s stomach turned summersaults partly because she wondered who else heard his words, but mostly because of his obvious concern for her. Not that she couldn’t take care of herself. It wasn’t as if she was going to let herself get shot; she had known exactly what she was doing. The only reason she hadn’t used the Force to freeze the guard before he could fire, was because she had worried that it would appear like Kylo was the one doing it, and it might escalate the situation.

She extinguished her lightsaber and put her free hand on his shoulder, pushing him back down into his seat. It was only possible because he didn’t resist. She used it as an opportunity to lean forward and whisper in his ear, “Please.”

“Don’t do this," he implored as she pulled away.

Looking into his eyes like this, she could almost believe it was just the two of them. “I have to,” she told him, swallowing heavily. 

At least she wasn’t blushing as she stood back from him, even if she felt embarrassed and wondered what everyone else made of that moment.

He made no further attempt to protest, and he looked utterly defeated. Rey had only seen him look that way once before. When he had knelt on Crait as she closed the door of the Millennium Falcon on him.

She turned and sat in the witness stand, wondering how she would make it through this if he was going to sit there and look at her like this the whole time.

“Master Rey,” Hennis began. “I’d like to ask you about the Battle of Crait.”

She nodded and tried hard to not look at Kylo.

“My client is charged with kidnapping and torturing you during that battle. Will you please tell the court how you came to be aboard the Supremacy that day?”

She took a deep breath and said, “I wasn’t kidnapped. I surrendered to the First Order.”

“Could you please explain?” Hennis said.

“I took one of the Millennium Falcon’s escape pods and sent a message to the First Order, letting them know I was coming. And I let them bring me on board.”

“Why did you surrender?” Hennis asked.

“I...I had a vision. I believed if I surrendered that Ben Solo would turn away from the Dark Side and come back to the Light.” 

“A vision?” Hennis asked a little unsure of how to proceed. Evidently, they didn’t often deal with visions in court. “From the Force?”

“I thought so,” Rey admitted. “But it might have been a trap that Snoke laid for me. I’m no longer sure.”

“What makes you think that Snoke sent the vision?”

“He admitted as much. He claimed that he was the one. . . The one to send the vision.” 

She wondered if she was really going to make it through this without talking about the bond.

“Maybe we should take a step back,” Hennis said, nodding. “Please tell me what happened when you were brought aboard the Supremacy.”

Rey nodded.

"They brought my pod into one of the hangers. When the pod came to a halt, even before it opened, he was there, Kylo Ren, waiting for me. There was also an entire division . . . Well, maybe it was a division? I don’t really know how many Stormtroopers are in a division.”

Rey could feel the Judge’s eyes boring into her, and she realized she was rambling a bit.

“The Stormtroopers had binders,” she continued. “But it was Kylo Ren who put them on me, and at that point, we left them, the Stormtroopers that is, behind us. He escorted me to Snoke personally. There weren’t any other guards.

“Oh, and he took my lightsaber, then he took me to Snoke.”

“Did you make any attempts to break free from your restraints or escape?” Hennis asked.

“No,” Rey said. “I was there for a reason; in fact, I told him in the lift on our way to Snoke. I told him about the vision I had about him turning, and he told me he also had a vision, but in his vision, I was the one who would turn.”

“And then,” Hennis prompted her.

“Yes, well, then he did take me to Snoke,” as she said the words the memories came back and she shuddered slightly as she suddenly remembered he torture.

It must have been apparent from her face because Hennis’ voice softened. “I’m sorry, but I need to ask you what happened next. What happened when you were brought to Snoke.”

“He tortured me,” Rey said, trying to keep her voice even. “He ripped my mind apart, looking for the map to Skywalker. For anything and everything I knew about the Resistance.”

“And did Kylo Ren participate in this?” Hennis asked.

“No,” Rey’s voice was quiet now. She couldn’t almost feel Snoke’s presence in her mind again, like slimy fingers trying to worm their way between the folds of her brain into her very being. “He sat there and knelt the whole time. The torture was all Snoke.”

“What happened next?” Hennis said gently.

Rey was relieved that they weren’t going to go over every detail of her torture. Unless Kappa decided to when Rey was cross-examined. Trying to find some proof that Kylo had, in fact, been part of it.

“I called out to Ben to help me to put a stop to it. But Snoke laughed and-“

“Rey!” Kylo called out to her in warning. His face was pained, anxious. She didn’t know why he wanted her to stop. This was the moment when he’d saved her. Was it really that terrible if the Galaxy knew that?

“Silence!” the Judge demanded, slamming down his gavel. “If you make another attempt to interrupt the witness, I’ll have you removed from the courtroom.”

The look Kylo gave the Judge was dangerous. If he hadn’t been cut off from the Force, Rey had little doubt that he would be choking the Judge at that very moment.

“Continue,” the Judge told her.

“Right, um, where was I? Snoke yes, he laughed. He told me I was foolish for thinking that Ben would turn. He said that he sensed weakness in his Apprentice and exploited it. That he sent the visions because he knew that I would sense the compassion in Ben, and think I could turn him. He said he knew every piece of Kylo’s mind, every thought, and intention. Then he, I guess you could say he dangled me in front Ben and-oh I forgot.” Rey interrupted herself.

“It’s important. I forgot to mention that when I was brought before Snoke, Kylo handed over my lightsaber. And Snoke put it right next to his throne. That’s important. Sorry.”

“Quiet all right, Master Rey,” Hennis said. “Please continue.”

“Right so, Snoke was holding me in the air, with the Force, in front of Kylo Ren. And he said something about how there was no conflict left in Kylo only resolve, and he ordered him to kill me. And I called to Ben, and Snoke said how he could see Kylo’s intention to turn the lightsaber on his true enemy and kill them. And Kylo Ren’s lightsaber was being held by the Force between us, and I could see it turning towards me, and if he ignited it, it would have killed me, but instead. . .”

They had never talked about this moment. Not in all their time on Garnik V. They always talked around it, and maybe that was because of her. Because she was afraid of what it meant, he had killed Snoke for her but also been unwilling to come with her. She was too scared of what it all meant. That it meant too much that it didn’t mean enough. Had he been trying to save her? Or only reaching for more power?

Rey looked in Kylo’s eyes now, and he shook his head slightly. Still asking her not to continue. She might never know the truth of his intentions, but she could at least finally speak the truth about what he had done.

“Instead, he activated the other lightsaber,” she finished. “The one that was sitting next to Snoke. He ignited it and cut Snoke in half.”

She heard people in the court gasp. They must have been expecting her to now tell a story of how she dramatically broke free from Snoke and fought them both. They didn’t expect to hear her say that Kylo Ren had saved her.

For the first time since taking the witness stand, she let herself really look at Kylo. He was slumped back in his seat, he seemed resigned. As if she had just signed his death warrant, not admitted to an act of bravery on his part.

“I’m sorry,” Hennis said. “I thought you said the lightsaber was next to Snoke on the throne?”

“Yes, it was,” Rey agreed.

“I’m not sure I understand how he could have activated it then. Are you sure it was him?”

“Of course, I could show you?” she was unsure if this was proper or not.

Hennis nodded.

“Right,” Rey said, unclipping her lightsaber again. She held it in front of her before shifting her grasp so that she was holding it only with the Force. 

“So let’s say this was my old lightsaber, and uh, Snoke was sitting over there.” She gestured to an empty area where no one would get hurt when she ignited the lightsaber.

“And mmm,” she looked around for something to stand in for the other lightsaber. Her eyes fell on the Judge’s gavel, and she began to lift it into the air.

“Stop that!” the Judge ordered, startling her so that both objects fell.

Or more precisely, the gavel fell, because reflexively Rey reached out with her hand to catch the lightsaber. The gavel, on the other hand, dropped to the Judge’s desk and then bounced and hit the ground. Hennis scrambled forward and gathered it up to hand it back to the Judge.

“Sorry, I just needed something to be the other lightsaber,” Rey apologized sheepishly.

“I don’t think we need these theatrics,” the Judge said.

“On the contrary, Your Honor,” Kappa stood up and disagreed. “We may have just exposed a new crime the defendant is guilty of. I think it is of utmost importance that we establish the exact chain of events.”

“Objection,” Hennis said. “Supreme Leader Snoke was not a member of the New Republic, and his death clearly took place on board a First Order ship, and therefore on First Order sovereign soil. His death is no business of this court, but a matter to be dealt with by the First Order.”

“Enough,” the Judge said. “This court is not concerned with the death of Supreme Leader Snoke. In fact, Counsellor,” he addressed Hennis, “I’d like you to explain how the death of Supreme Leader Snoke is in any way relevant to clearing the defendant of the charges?”

Rey tried very hard to listen to the ongoing arguments between the attorneys and the Judge, but a feeling of dread had come over her. She suddenly understood why Kylo had not wanted her to testify, and why Hennis had been so happy after she had mentioned that Kylo was the one to kill Snoke. 

_Rey, you’ve set my mind at ease. I can’t say I’ve been comfortable with the fact that I’m helping Kylo Ren escape his crimes, but now..._

Hennis was hoping to win his case with the New Republic, and then turn Kylo Ren over to the First Order. It had never occurred to Rey that killing Snoke could be considered a crime, it had been the act that had saved her own life. But the First Order wouldn’t see it that way, or at least Hennis was banking on the fact they wouldn’t.

And more than ever, Rey felt confused by the whole system. How could you only choose to care about some deaths and not others? 

Rey had killed people, the war had forced her to. Did that make her a killer? Objectively yes, but even so, she couldn’t help but feel those deaths were different than the ones of the villagers of Tuanul. And yet death was part of the Force just like life was. There could be no death without life. But that argument was worse because then you could justify killing anyone, and that was plainly wrong.

There was right and wrong; Rey was sure of that, she’d always known that, and until recently, she’d always thought she knew what they were. No, that wasn’t true, she realized. She’d thought she’d known the difference until she’d learned the truth about what Luke had tried to do to his nephew at the Jedi temple.

Luke Skywalker had done a horrible thing, made a horrible mistake, but he wasn’t a horrible person. Master Luke’s mistakes didn’t make him evil. And sadly, she realized, killing Snoke did not make Kylo good.

Both men had stumbled from their chosen paths, but then they had gotten back on them. 

Rey realized how naive she had been to think she could go to the Supremacy and turn Kylo Ren. But now she realized that in some ways she had been right. He could have chosen the Light then. He could have chosen a different path. But he hadn’t.

And there was no reason to think he ever would.

His path and hers were like two intersecting lines circling a globe. They were destined to meet over and over, but they would also always part to continue on their own way, to follow their own path.

* * *

**Garnik V 40 days after the crash**

It was the hardest thing she had ever done, teaching herself to ignore the feeling of his body. To shut out the way, the water wrapped itself around his limbs or the pleasing way his muscles worked as he propelled his way through the water. And Rey had to teach herself to push down the feelings of panic when she felt the gentle burning in his lungs as he dove deeper and deeper below the surface.

Because things did not go well when she panicked.

Instinctively she would forget that her consciousness was only supposed to be a passenger in Kylo Ren’s body, and she would try to force him up above the water.

That never worked. Kylo Ren's will was too strong for her to be able to use him like a puppet. Once he felt her panic, he would return to the surface, and try and convince her that he was nowhere near out of breath, and try and remind her that he was perfectly comfortable in the water.

Even more frustrating was the fact that it worked just fine when he wasn’t swimming. After several days of practice on land, Kylo was able to open himself up to her, so that she could see through his eyes, and even use the Force to levitate objects that he could see but she couldn’t.

But it all went wrong as soon as he got in the water. Those first terrifying moments on this planet, where Rey had been forced to eject from her ship, and she had nearly drowned while still strapped into the seat, and left a more profound mark on her than she’d like to admit.

“Sorry,” she said, as he emerged from the water, after another failed attempt.

She knew he was frustrated, but she was surprised that he wasn’t angry. Especially since when she failed at this, she instinctively tried to take over his body.

He sighed as he pushed back wet locks of hair from his face. “I can’t believe I’m going to say this, but there’s only one way this is going to work. I need to teach you to let go of your fear and learn to surrender. I need to teach you how to be a Jedi.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So now that Disney + is a thing, I have been re-watching the prequels. Turns out my memory wasn't that bad. It's just that it was Obi-Wan and Anakin who went into a bar and cut off someone's arm. Turns out all you have to do is say "Jedi business" and everyone goes back to drinking and dancing.


	20. Jedi Training

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey is cross-examined. Kylo tries to teach her to be a Jedi.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks so much as always for the Kudos and comments.

Hennis had failed to convince the Judge that details of Snoke’s death were relevant to the trial.

After that, Hennis’ questions had turned to a less spectacular line of inquiry. Asking her about various battles, the same way they had questioned Poe, to find out how many casualties Kylo was directly responsible for, and whether they were Resistance members or civilians.

Rey supposed she’d held up her end of being a trustworthy Jedi, because much of what Rey knew, she knew because she had heard Poe testify about the same things. Time and again, she had to admit she had no knowledge outside of the trial of the things she was being asked about. 

Finally, Hennis turned back to something she could answer.

“Was it your choice to have Kylo Ren tried in this manner?”

Their question wasn’t much of a surprise. Ever since Leia’s testimony Rey had realized that Hennis was likely to ask her about her involvement as a representative of the Jedi.

“No, it wasn’t. I was unsure about the trial from the beginning.”

“Because he should be first judged by the Jedi Council?” Hennis asked.

Rey considered how to answer. “I wasn’t aware of the laws concerning the Jedi, and the Council at the time,” she admitted. “It simply felt wrong.”

She wished she could give a better answer. That she could claim that she’d had a right to judge Kylo and that it had been taken away from her. But she hadn’t known. And part of her was still unsure if she was the right one to judge him.

“So, no one informed you of your right as a representative of the Jedi Council to hold your own trial?”

“No, but I don’t think anyone realized that was an option.”

Rey felt terrible admitting that, but she would never imply that Poe had been trying to subvert the system. Everyone here seemed to care a great deal about the system, including Poe.

“And now that you know, do you think Ben Solo should be handed over to you for judgment?”

Rey had been thinking about this a great deal over the last few days, and she knew the answer.

But before she could answer, the Judge slammed down his gavel. “That’s enough, Counselor. I told you earlier, I will not have you question the legitimacy of these proceedings.”

Rey answered anyway. “Yes, he should have been handed over to me.” 

The Judge slammed down his gavel. “The witnesses' answer will be struck from the record.”

Hennis looked unhappy, but they decide not to press the Judge.

“No further questions, Your Honor.”

Rey was somewhat relieved. There were, after all, a lot of questions she didn’t have answers to, like what she would have done if he had been handed over to her.

Although she had come to accept the court in some ways, there was undoubtedly wisdom in have a group of people decide instead of only one person; she also couldn’t help but feel that whatever happened, this court wasn’t prepared to deal with Kylo Ren.

And of course, the Jedi way wasn’t meant to be one person deciding. There was supposed to be an entire Council. But there wasn’t, there was just her.

But Kappa finally had her chance to question Rey, and she wasn’t wasting any time.

“You introduced yourself as Master Rey, correct?” the Prosecutor asked.

“Yes, that’s right,” Rey said, a little worried that Kappa was about to question her right to call herself a Jedi.

“You choose to not use your last name?”

Inwardly Rey breathed a sigh of relief as he realized that this was about her parents and her citizenship, not her place as a Jedi. She was also grateful that she was prepared for what was going to come.

“I don’t know what it is,” Rey admitted, a little surprised by the sadness that still haunted her voice when thinking about her family. 

“Were these your parents?” Kappa asked softly, as she presented the holos she’d show to Rey the day before.

“Yes, that’s them.”

It still hurt looking at them. And without thinking, Rey looked from them to Kylo. His too expressive face showed worry and concern for her. Whatever anger he might feel towards her, she was uncomfortably aware that he did care.

And it hurt that she wouldn’t be able to talk to him about this. That she wouldn’t be able to share her loneliness with him the way she had in the hut on Ahch-To.

Even so, she wasn’t completely alone.

“Let the record show,” Kappa announced loudly, “That Master Rey is, in fact, Rey Starfallen, daughter of Trisha Starfallen of Coruscant and Jireen Starfallen of Rattak. Rey Starfallen was born on Rattak, and is a citizen of the New Republic.”

The questions Rey had shut out the other day suddenly flooded back with those details. Why had her mother left Coruscant, and presumably gone to Rattak? Why had her family left Rattak after Rey had been born, and gone to Jakku of all places?

“I’m sorry, what did you say?” Rey asked as she realized Kappa had asked her a new question.

“I asked how many members of the Resistance did you know when you went to Takodona?”

“Just BB-8, I suppose. I thought Finn was Resistance at the time, but he wasn’t yet.”

“So you were _not_ part of the Resistance at that time?”

“No, I was trying to help, but no, I suppose I wasn’t.”

“So you were a New Republic civilian at the time that Kylo Ren abducted you?”

“Objection,” Hennis spoke up. “It has not been established that she was abducted.”

“Sustained,” the Judge agreed.

Kappa nodded. “Tell me, did you encounter Kylo Ren when you were on Takodona?”

“Yes, I did,” Rey nodded.

“And what happened when you two met?”

“There was a Stormtrooper after BB-8, I shot him, then I ran. Someone was following me, so I,” she shrugged. “So I shot at him. It was Kylo Ren. He deflected every blast with his lightsaber and just kept coming.”

She stopped. For a moment, she wished she could remember the fear and terror she had felt at the time. Being chased by a monster in the mask. That at least was a clean and simple emotion, unlike what she felt now as she turned her last name over and over in her head, wondering how something so simple could hold so much power of her.

“Then, he froze me.”

“Froze you?”

“Yes, with the Force. He immobilized me in place, I couldn’t move. He asked me where BB-8 was, and when I didn’t answer, he looked into my mind and realized I had seen the map to Skywalker. I heard a voice then, not his. Something about the Resistance. And then he gave the order for them to leave, and then...I don’t know. I lost consciousness.”

“I’m sorry to make you relive this, but I must ask, what’s the next thing you remember?”

“When I woke up, I was in a cell, strapped down. I found out later I was on Starkiller base, but I didn’t know it then. And he was there, Kylo Ren, waiting for me to wake up.”

“So, he took you against your will from Takodona and then restrained you?”

“Yes,” Rey admitted. She couldn’t help but look back at Kylo then, wondering if he was angry at her for disclosing this.

But he didn’t seem to be. And Rey realized she shouldn’t have been surprised. He wasn’t one to pretend that he hadn’t done the things he had done, or to sugarcoat his actions. Kylo Ren knew who and what he was, or at least he thought he did. He was more than just the monster in the mask, but he preferred for that to be all others saw. She wasn’t sure he was as comfortable with that as he pretended, but he certainly didn’t try and hide the things he’d done.

“And what happened once you were his prisoner?” Kappa’s questioning continued.

Rey considered for a moment what to say. She could remember every moment of that meeting. Remember him taking off his mask and her seeing his face for the first time. It felt too intimate a detail to share, a moment she wanted to keep to herself.

But Kappa misunderstood her silence. “I know it can be traumatic to remember these things, but please, Master Rey, I need you to tell us what happened.”

“He asked about BB-8,” Rey said. “I started to give him technical specifications, and then. Then he started to dig into my mind...”

“Take your time,” Kappa encouraged her.

Rey shook her head. It wasn’t trauma that was keeping her from speaking, she just didn’t know how to describe what happened next. 

“He wanted the map, but it’s not what he found. As he was digging through my mind, he...I suppose he got lost or distracted.”

Kylo snorted quietly at that, but the attention that drew to him seemed to make him a little uncomfortable, and he shifted around in his seat.

“He began to speak...The things I felt, my dreams. He was looking for the map, but he kept getting sidetracked and then...And then suddenly I saw a way in, a way back towards his mind. I saw...“

_The same loneliness that was in me_, she thought quietly to herself.

“I saw his fears and doubts. I was in his head, and when I told him what I saw, he stopped and pulled back. He left then.”

“But to be clear,” Kappa said. “Before he left, he tortured you?”

“Well, it wasn’t pleasant, but it was nothing compared to what Snoke did. I don’t think he was actively trying to hurt me.”

“But it did hurt?”

“Yes,” Rey agreed.

“And he forced his way into your thoughts without permission?”

“Yes, but I did the same thing to him, so on that front, we’re even right?”

“You were a prisoner, fighting back, an amazing feet given your captor. Self-defense is not a crime.”

For a moment, Rey wondered why Kappa was trying to make her feel better about what she had done, not that Rey felt any guilt about pushing back into Kylo Ren’s mind. Then she realized that it wasn’t for her, it was for the sake of the jury.

“Now, you said you were on Starkiller base, yes?” Kappa confirmed.

“Yes, that’s right.”

“So, you were there to witness Han Solo’s murder?”

“Objection,” Hennis interjected. “The question of whether Han Solo’s death was murder is still an open question.”

Kappa nodded. “Han Solo’s death then?”

“Yes,” Rey said softly. Remembering Han never got any easier. Of everything Kylo Ren had done, this was still the thing that hurt the most. The things she found hardest to forgive or move past. Maybe that showed a moral failing in her, that she cared more about the death of one man she knew, even if only briefly, more than she cared about the massacre of an entire village.

“And was it Kylo Ren, who killed him?”

“Yes,” Rey answered without hesitation. She might not like the truth, but that didn’t change it.

“And you witnessed this personally?”

“Yes,” Rey said automatically.

“There was no one else present who could have killed him?”

“That’s right.”

“You saw Kylo Ren, or rather, Ben Solo strike down his own father in anger?”

“No,” Rey said, breaking out of the rhythm of the questioning. 

Hennis had started to rise, presumably to object, but quietly retook their seat.

“I’m sorry?!” Kappa was startled by the answer. The attorney had been building up to that question, and Rey had disrupted her. “You just said the Defendant was the one to kill Han Solo. Are you suddenly changing your story?”

“No, Ben Solo, he defiantly killed Han Solo, but you asked if he struck him down in anger. He wasn’t angry.”

“That’s not what your friend Finn said. I believe the word he used to describe Kylo Ren when they fought on Starkiller base was ‘enraged’”.

“Yes,” Rey agreed. “He was angry when he fought me and Finn, but that was after he killed his father, and got shot in the stomach with a bowcaster. Oh, and Finn had his grandfather’s lightsaber. Yes, he was very angry then, but not when he killed Han. He wasn’t angry then.”

“Your Honor,” Kappa turned towards the Judge, “I’d like the witness's last statement struck from the record. She can’t testify to the emotional state of another.”

“Objection,” Hennis stood up. “It was the Prosecution who brought up the question of my client’s emotional state. Also, Master Rey is a Jedi, and a Jedi who is reading the thoughts or emotions of another person can be called on to testify to that person's thoughts and emotions.”

The Judge looked at Rey, “Were you reading his thoughts or emotions at the time?”

“At the time? No, Your Honor,” Rey admitted. 

The Judge nodded, “Sustained, the jury will disregard Master Rey’s testimony as to the emotional state of the Defendant. As well as the Prosecution’s claim that the Defendant was angry.”

* * *

**Garnik V 45 days after the crash**

As it turned out, Kylo Ren was a good teacher.

He should have been the worst person in the world to teach Rey to control her emotions. To show her to be calm and still and let go of her fears. And yet he was surprisingly good at it.

She was smart enough to not ask him if the lessons he gave her had been learned from his Uncle. She supposed she knew the answer after all.

It was a painful look at the things she might have learned if Master Luke had been willing to teach her.

They were not all pleasant. 

She had to face the fact that the ocean frightened her. Her first moments on this planet, she had nearly drowned, and that had left a more profound mark than she had thought. Perhaps it was because it was a danger so outside of the experiences of most of her life.

Jakku had a thousand ways to kill you, drowning just wasn’t one of them.

He did insist on giving her further swimming lessons. That was the practical way to deal with her fear. She hated it, but she couldn’t deny the fact that it might help them get off the planet. And if it didn’t work and they were stranded here, swimming was going to be a useful skill.

His strategy seemed to be to wear her out in the mornings with physical exertion and then try to force her to concentrate in the afternoons.

She didn’t always like like it, but she could feel the lessons changing her. It was just that she became better at meditating, but she was becoming more and more intended to the Force all the time. 

She had an innate ability. Still, with Kylo explaining the Force, helping her to understand it intellectually as opposed to just on a gut level, she found that she was making leaps and bounds in her understanding and skills.

It was too bad her swimming wasn’t coming along in the same way. But at least she was at the point where she didn’t instantly feel like she was going to drown.

He taught her to focus, to drive out all distractions. Little by little, she was able to move her consciousness to his form without being distracted by everything he felt.

He managed to teach her to be far more focused than he himself was, which became rather humorously apparent one day. They were once again practicing with her trying to use the Force while looking through his eyes. 

She had gotten better at this and was working on not just lifting a single rock, but arranging a pile of stones that sat between them. 

A cool breeze blew against them both. Rey ignored it quickly, although she could simultaneously feel it against her skin and his. She wasn’t even aware that the cool air on her damp clothes had caused her nipples to harden until his focus shifted from the rocks to her.

Even then, there was a moment where she didn’t understand why he was suddenly looking at her intently. Then she felt a sensation that was both familiar and alien. Lust she knew; the feeling of heat between her legs, the gentle throb and ache to be touched on that very sensitive spot. But the feeling of blood rushing south, of growing larger and harder, was startling.

The moment she understood what was happening, she lost all semblance of calm, and her consciousness snapped back to her body.

Her eyes fluttered open, and she caught him trying very hard to look away as if he’d never been looking at all, but also blushing furiously.

The feelings of arousal had been so intense that she was half surprised that she couldn’t see him sporting a massive erection sticking straight up into the air. But he was only semi-hard, and although she thought she could make out the outline of his desire, it wasn’t as noticeable as she thought it should be. 

But his blush and stammered apology told her that she hadn’t imagined it. And curiosity got the best of her. She pulled herself out of her meditative pose and half crawled towards him, reaching between his legs to discover just how hard he was.

He clearly hadn’t been expecting that, and part of him tried to pull away, even as the part of him that had distracted her in the first place seemed to jump into her hand. 

No, he hadn’t been all that hard a moment ago, but she could feel him quickly growing in her hand.

“Rey, stop.” If he had meant to sound forceful, it came out sounding like a half-hearted plea.

But Rey had gotten some ideas into her head.

“Shh,” she told him. “I’m trying to concentrate.” She straddled his legs, pinning him down so he couldn’t move too far from her.

She closed her eyes, seeing if she could meld her awareness with his, while also stroking him. Hoping that she could feel what he felt when she touched him like this.

Sadly that turned out to be a lost cause. Rey couldn’t seem to center herself enough. She didn’t know if his arousal had infected her. Or if it was just knowing how easily he became aroused by her, but regardless her own need was growing and making anything resembling meditation impossible.

“Rey,” he moaned, “We need to be practicing.”

He tried to lean further back on his hands and away from her, but it only pushed his crotch up further into her hand. Maybe that was accidental, or maybe he didn’t want her to stop as much as he said he did.

“I am practicing, at least with the Force,” she insisted as a sudden bit of inspiration hit her.

This wasn’t exactly what she was supposed to be doing, but she suddenly felt like exploring her powers in new ways.

She removed the hand that had been stroking him. He sighed and began to sit back up, but she pushed lightly on his chest with hand. When he reached to stop her, she grabbed his wrists with the Force and ended up pushing him to the ground, pinning his hands above his head with the Force.

“Rey? What are you doing?” He tried to make his voice sound stern but failed miserably. Instead, there was a sort of breathless excitement to his voice.

“Testing my powers,” she told him.

For a moment, she didn’t touch him, just looked at him, lying there pinned down by her will, and she was excited by the opportunity it presented.

She licked her lips as she reached back to check her hair and make sure that it was securely pinned back.

Then she knelt over him, bringing her face level with his. She did her best to keep her body from touching his, and he tried to raise himself up to catch her lips, but she pushed him back down with the Force. She could feel his power start to surge against hers, and she held him even more firmly.

He relented, breathing heavily. It wasn’t, Rey knew, from exertion, he had far more strength in him than he’d just tried to fight her with. He was giving in by choice, and that in and of itself was exciting.

As a reward for giving in, she ran her tongue along his lips, parting them slightly before pulling away.

Instead, she kissed his scar. The one that ran from his face down to his chest. The one she had given him. 

She released her hold on him for a moment, so she could help him out of his shirt because she loved to look at his chest. He aided her in removing the garment, then reached her for her, but she forced him down once again. 

“Stay, still,” she told him.

The edge of his lips quirked into a smile. “Yes, Master,” he teased.

“I’m not your Master,” she told him.

Considering how he’d been treated by his previous Masters, she didn’t really want to be one of their number.

“I’m just an excellent student. So you’ll have to tell me if I do something wrong.”

A little more of her nervousness slipped through than she’d intended. She’d never done anything like this, she wasn’t even sure how to do it properly.

“You couldn’t do anything wrong,” he told her.

Which should have been encouraging, but made her even more nervous. To hide it, she kissed his stomach, just above his belly button while she gathered her courage. She wondered why his pants had to have such a high waist and decided the obvious thing was to get rid of them.

She smiled as she watched his cock spring free of its confines. If he hadn’t been fully hard before, he was now, and she loved the visible sign of his desire. She quickly finished undressing him, carefully not to touch his eager member as she did so.

Once he was fully naked, she stopped to take a look. His body wasn’t exactly foreign to her at this point, but she’d never felt free to just look at him like this before, and she liked it.

She was intrigued by the sharp lines that angled from his hips down to the nest of curls, and she kissed and licked her way down one side, then the other, still careful not to touch his eager erection. She felt him struggle beneath her a bit and pressed down on his hips with the Force to keep him in place.

He whimpered. 

“Are you afraid?” she asked, half concerned, half intrigued by his response to being helpless. 

“Yes,” he said needily.

“Of what?” she asked, intrigued by the fact that fear wasn’t happening his desire.

A blush seemed to creep across his whole body.

“That you won’t give me what I want,” he admitted after a moment.

“And what’s that?” she asked, emboldened now that she knew she wasn’t pushing him towards something he didn’t want.

His blush deepened. 

**Tell me,** she projected the words into his mind, hoping that it would convey her curiosity and that he would realize that she really wanted to know what he wanted.

For a moment, she thought he was going to project what he wanted into her mind, but evidently, he was quite ready to do that.

“Your mouth on my cock,” he finally admitted with a whimper.

He had squeezed his eyes closed so he couldn’t see her reaction, obviously worried about what she might say or think about his desire.

The truth is, once upon a time, she never would have thought that she would ever want to do something like this. It had always seemed somewhat demeaning. But now that she’d actually had sex, now that she knew how good it could feel to make a partner also feel good, she wanted to try this. She wanted to see just what it would do to him.

And she wanted to tease him just a bit more.

“Hmmm, too bad,” she said. “I was only going to use my tongue.”

He groaned.

She took that as encouragement and bent down over him, to see what it would be like to lick his cock. It had fallen over his stomach in a way that made it easy to lick up the underside of it, and his gurgled moans made it clear that he liked it. 

However, her tongue alone wasn’t going to be enough to handle him, so she relented and grasped him with one hand, so she could more easily trace the head of his cock with her tongue. She explored the contours of it, before testing out the precum that was pooling at the top.

She had worried the taste would bother her, but it didn’t; instead, forgetting all about her earlier words, she sucked the head into her mouth.

“Fuck, Rey!” he begged her, even as his hips jerked, and he tried to surge up into her mouth.

She pushed him down once again with the Force, and he made no attempt to resist. But she wondered if that was because his concentration had been shattered.

“I said stay still,” she teased told him. She was enjoying this far more than she had thought she would. He was so needy and desperate, and something was intoxicating about the power she had over him that hadn’t nothing at all to do with the Force.

When she felt him try and still himself, she continued. 

He was just too big to fit all of in her mouth at once. But he didn’t seem to mind as she experimented with her hand and mouth taking him as deeply as she could and letting her hand finish the stroke.

It took a few tries and a few cautious suggestions from Kylo, but soon she had developed a rhythm that left him gasping and begging as her head bobbed up and down on his cock.

“Please, Rey, I can’t...I’m going to...” And just like that, he had pushed passed her restraints. His hand was on the back of her head, and she could feel his cum hit the back of her throat. He held her in place while the intensity of his orgasm overtook him.

For just a moment, his thumb gently stroked the side of her face, before he seemed to realize what had happened.

“I”m sorry, I didn’t mean to...I tried to warn you.”

She couldn’t help but smile as she wiped away some of his cum from the edge of her mouth.

“It’s okay,” she told him. “I didn’t mind.”

Even if she had, the look he gave her then might have been enough to make up for it.

“You should,” he said, but there was something teasing and suggestive in his voice. “I’m trying to teach you to be a Jedi, and do you know what Jedi do?”

“What?” she asked, amused.

“They don’t hold people down with the Force, they surrender.” 

Rey almost laughed at that, but she could feel him gather his power, and slowly, he pushed her back to the ground, following so that now he was on top of her.

She felt her hands moved above her head by the Force until her wrists were crossed. He kissed her deeply then. If he was bothered by the lingering taste of his own seed in her mouth, he gave no sign.

He pulled back, and she could feel his hands begin to slip her own pants down.

“So be a good little Jedi,” he said before kissing her stomach. “And surrender.”

As his mouth traveled lower, she gasped, and any thought of fighting back was gone.


	21. Closing Arguments

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The attorneys give their closing arguments. Rey and Kylo try to retrieve Rey's ship.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks as always for the comments and kudos.
> 
> If you're not familiar with the term proprioception, it's often considered the sixth sense, and is the basic feeling of your body, and where it's located in space relative to the rest of you. I have a link with more details at the end, but it's an obscure enough word (but also perfect for what is happening) that I thought I'd call it out here.
> 
> As for the reason for the surprise update, I'll be posting a little more frequently in the lead up to TROS. I want to have chapter 4 of part two up before TROS comes out, and then I'll probably settle down a little.

**Garnik V 47 days after the crash**

The world shifted under her as the raft bobbed on the ocean, but Rey was still. Inside there was only calm.

Little by little, she shut it all out until there was nothing but her and Kylo.

He was already in the water floating near the raft. They had found he was less likely to disturb Rey's mediation if she didn’t feel the change in buoyancy when his massive form left the raft.

He waited for her calmly, accepting and welcoming her consciousness as it settled into his mind.

But he was not completely open to her. They had learned through trial and error, that it was best if blocked several parts of himself from her. The feel of the water on his skin faded away, she lost track of the movement of his limbs as he blocked her from his sense of proprioception.

Finally, there was nothing but what he saw and what he heard. 

Once he was sure he was blocking her from anything that might distract her, he dove under the water.

It was almost as if she were watching the feed from a droid. At least that’s how she preferred to think of it, as her consciousness followed Kylo down to the depths and observed through his eyes and ears.

Then he spotted it. The wreckage of Rey's ship lying on a large mass of sort of thick colorful organism. For a moment, she was worried that it might attack him, but whatever it was, seemed more like plant life. She might have even thought it was a rock formation if it wasn’t for the intricate organic patterns of its branches.

She had to remind herself that whatever it was, wasn’t important. With Kylo blocking her, she had no notion of how tired or out of breath he was, but there was no point in wasting time.

She concentrated, and the ship began to move rising up through the water towards the surface.

Kylo followed behind it, keeping his eye, and by extensions, Rey’s on it as the ship ascended.

There was a moment when she lost it. When Kylo's head broke the surface, and he blinked as his eyes adjusted to the sunlight.

But even as her grip with the Force slipped, he reached out to catch the ship, which was good; otherwise, it might have landed on his head.

She snapped back to her own body and tried to take the ship back from him.

“I’ve got it,” she told him.

“Really?” he teased her. “Because for a moment there, I thought you were going to try and get rid of me now that you have a ship to escape on.

She looked at the wrecked ship. One of the wings had been sheared off, and a massive amount of water was dripping out of it.

“I don’t think it’s going to fly again. I mean, other than like this.” By this point, she had retaken control as he pulled himself up onto the raft.

“As long as we can use the communications equipment, it doesn’t need to fly,” He told her as he reached out and helped her guide the ship to the shore.

* * *

Kappa stood before the court.

“The crimes you have been brought here to consider, are not ordinary, “ she began addressing the jury. “But these are not ordinary times. We are under attack by those who see no value in life. Who don’t worry or consider the fall out from their actions. Who kill civilians and soldiers alike.

“And leading this pack of thugs, is one man, Kylo Ren. Now the Defense will have you believe that this is all ordinary. That this is how wars are fought. That these aren’t crimes. The Defense will present you with a thousand technicalities and say this is why you should find the defendant not guilty. Not because he didn’t do these things, but because of where he did them. Because the Defense will have you believe that war justifies any action.

“But war is not a justification for immorality. The facts are clear. Kylo Ren, also known as Ben Solo, lead a force on Jakku that massacred a village. He kidnapped Commander Poe Dameron and then tortured him. A pattern he would repeat when he had Rey Starfallen kidnapped and also tortured. 

“He murdered his own father.

“He has led attack after attack against the New Republic, and he’s even turned against the First Order and killed the previous Supreme Leader, all in a bid for more personal power.

“And the Defense will deny none of this. No one says he didn’t do these things, only that they don’t count. The Defense will tell you that you have to ignore these crimes because the New Republic didn’t formally reclaim Jakku when the Imperial Remnant abandoned it. 

“They will tell you that Commander Dameron’s torture doesn’t count because it happened on First Order ship. That Master Rey’s torture doesn’t matter because it happened on a First Order base. But the only reason these things happened outside the New Republic was that at the time, the First Order had not yet taken over any New Republic worlds.

“But now they have. You know as well as I do that some of the Western Reaches have fallen to the First Order. And do we think for a minute that this behavior has stopped just because they have entered New Republic space?

“No, of course not. Because what Kylo Ren and the First Order have done is wrong. It’s illegal, and it will not stop unless we send a clear message. 

“But the Defense wants you to believe that this isn’t about right and wrong. That it’s about jurisdiction. That it’s about technicalities. 

“And yet they can’t decide if Kylo Ren is himself a civilian or member of the Military. When it’s convenient, he’s just another soldier fighting a war. When it’s not, he has no responsibility for military actions. Or maybe he’s a Jedi, and no one has the right judge him.

“The Defense can’t make up their mind. Why? Because there is no defense for the things, Kylo Ren has done. They can’t defend his actions, so they want you to believe that you have no right to judge him.

“They want you to believe there shouldn’t even be a trial, that we’re supposed to hand over these decisions to be made by a girl. An admirable and brave girl, yes, but one whose only considered a member of the Jedi Council because there isn’t anyone else."

With that, Kappa took her seat, and Hennis stood up slowly and turned to address the jury. 

“My colleague is wrong. I’m not here to talk to you about technicalities. I’m here to talk to you about right wrong. Justice and injustice.

“Because justice is not easy, if it was, we wouldn’t need trials.

"Most of you probably don’t remember the Empire. I do.

“I remember people disappearing in the middle of the night. I remember public trials whose only purpose was to instill fear in the populace, whose goal was to teach everyone one thing. The Emperor was right, and anyone who opposed him was wrong.

“And I’m sure the Emperor believed that. He believed he knew what was right and what was wrong. What was just and what was unjust. And his beliefs were the law. There was no due process, there was no appeal. There was only the Emperor and his judgment being carried out by the courts.

“That’s why, when the New Republic was formed, I became a defense attorney. I believe that we can’t just judge people based on what our gut tells us. That we can’t just jump to the conclusion that someone is guilty or not. That we need to judge everyone by the same rules and laws that we’ve agreed on ahead of time.

“Now, believe me, I’m aware of the irony. I’m aware that I’m defending a man who would be happy to judge you all. The First Order talks a lot about law and order, but what they mean is that those who oppose them will be punished, and those who agree will be spared.

“Because whatever they call themselves, we all know who the First Order really is. They are just the Empire under another name.

“But it’s important to remember who the Empire was. They were our government, as unjust and tyrannical a government as it was. And the Empire was overthrown by a group of citizens who refused to live under their laws. They were overthrown by rebels.

“And this war we are in, it’s not new. It’s the same civil war that began a generation ago. The Galaxy is not united.

“Some of its citizens, _us_, believe in Democracy, and the rule of law. Other’s believe in tyranny. They believe that they are reinstating the legitimate government that was forced into exile decades ago.

“So yes, we are fighting a civil war. And we need to decide why we are fighting. Are we better than the First Order? Do we believe in the ideals that caused a rebellion against the Empire, the ideals that individuals deserve the chance to prove their innocence? That individual worlds have sovereignty and a right to their own justice system.

“Because if we don’t believe in those things, why are we fighting? If we are not better than the First Order, if we don’t hold ourselves to a higher standard, then what is the point in this bloodshed?

“The Prosecution wants you to look at this as a simple case. They want you to believe this is a story of monsters and heroes. But this is a story of tragedy.

“Two men, a father, and son, who believed in different things, who chose different sides in this civil war, walked out onto a bridge in the middle of a battle. Only one of them was going to walk away from that bridge.

“If it had been Han Solo, we would have called him a hero. We would have praised him for being willing to sacrifice his own son for the good of the Republic. We would have taken the killing of his son as a sign that he held his ideals above even family. And we would have considered it a noble tragedy.

“But he’s not the one who walked away.

"His son did.

"Ben Solo chose his ideals over his father. And it would be easy to see that as a heartless act by an uncaring son. But he didn’t strike down his father without thought. This wasn’t a cold-blooded murder.

“They stopped on that bridge, and they talked. Neither man could simply kill the other because they weren’t just two soldiers, they were father and son.

“And if they had been, if they had been no relation, if they had been strangers, would we be here? Would we ask if it was murder? No, we wouldn’t. It just seems like murder because they knew each other. Because it wasn’t as clean and straightforward as we like to pretend battles are.

“But you know better. War isn’t simple. Battles aren’t clean. 

“Does that mean we should forgive everything? No, of course not. But does it mean that we need to be careful about what we call a crime while the war is still going on? Yes. 

“Because we all know this war is far from over. And what happens if we decide that anyone who fights against us is criminal? I know that seems natural, seems right, but think about it. Why should anyone ever surrender, why should any member of the First Order ever lay down their weapons if all the awaits them is judgment and death?

“Among the witnesses, in this case, was a remarkable and brave young man, Finn. He decided that what the First Order was doing was wrong, he decided to defect, to fight alongside us. But would he have done that if he knew that the first thing we would do was put him on trial?

“I worry that this war will not be over soon. And what happens when it does end? Do we try and execute every member of the First Order? Or do we try and find a way to stitch our society back together, to try and become one Galaxy again.

“And what if we lose? What about the people who are captured along the way? How do we want the First Order to treat us, to treat the people they take prisoners. We can’t expect them to be better than us, after all, if they were better than us, then we would be on the wrong side.

“But maybe we can convince them to be_ as_ good. Maybe we can convince them to treat our fighters as soldiers and not as criminals. So that when the day comes that this war ends, we can find a way to heal.

“I know that’s hard to hear. I know it’s hard to consider letting a man like Kylo Ren go. Because he’s not a good man. But he’s also not a criminal, not under the laws we have agreed to.

“Now, maybe those laws are wrong. Perhaps we need to reform them. Perhaps the Jedi have too much power. But it isn’t right to convict him in anticipation of laws we haven’t written yet.

“I’m asking you to judge him fairly. I’m asking you to consider that we are here for Justice and not Revenge. Should he be convicted of crimes on Jakku and Takodona? Possibly, but not by us, by the authorities of those planets. 

“Should he be judged for acts committed on First Order ships, like the murder of Supreme Leader Snoke? Probably, but that is for the First Order to decide.

“And what happens to the brave people fighting for the Resistance when peace does come? If Kylo Ren is responsible for the people he killed on Starkiller base, are the courageous soldiers who attacked and destroyed that base also accountable for all the First Order soldiers who died that day? Should the New Republic try them as well?

“Millions of people died in that attack, a world was destroyed. Was it a battle between two militaries, or an attack by a brave group of vigilantes, to defend the Republic?

“When the day comes that treaties are signed and this war ends, what precedent we will we have set here today for all those who fought on both sides of that battle?

“The Prosecution is asking you to judge this case on what is right and wrong. So am I. All people should be held accountable to the same systems of justice. _That,_ is what is right. If no other New Republic citizen can be held accountable by the New Republic for their actions on Jakku or other independent worlds than neither should my client.

“If our Senate agreed that the Jedi are to be judged first by other Jedi than that is the law we should hold to. Because if you don’t know what is illegal and what is not. If you can’t predict what laws the government will choose to ignore if it wants to do away with you. . . Well then, we’re back to the system of courts we had under the Empire, and it’s time to reconsider just what it is we are fighting for.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First off, writing closing arguments is really, really hard. I don't recommend it.
> 
> [proprioception](https://www.healthline.com/health/body/proprioception#How-is-proprioception-evaluated?)
> 
> And now for the fun stuff. The Reylo Fanfiction Anthology has been running an event parallel with nanowrimo for people to 'finish their fics'. I've actually been going back and forth between working on this and trying to finish up a Reylo fic I started, but never posted long before I started this one. Trying to figure out how that story might end, gave me some of the ideas for this fic, although I still don't know how the other one ends ;)
> 
> Regardless, I've finally posted the first chapter of [Fractured Crystal; Shattered Soul](https://archiveofourown.org/works/21584329/chapters/51462601) which despite the title is actually a great deal less angsty than this.
> 
> So yes, I'm going to be posting a lot this next month between the two fics.


	22. The Verdict

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And I've seen your flag on the marble arch  
Love is not a victory march  
It's a cold and it's a broken Hallelujah
> 
> -Leonard Cohen, Hallelujah

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here it is, the last chapter. This is going to be the one time I make a plea for comments. I'd really love to know what you all think of the verdict, whether you like it or not.

“How long can they take?” Rey asked Leia. 

But it was Hennis who answered from the other side of the room. “As long as they want. That’s the privilege of being on a jury. But don’t worry, they usually don’t like being locked in a room together for days on end.”

It had been hours already since the jury began their deliberations. Just outside the courtroom, Rey and Leia were waiting along with Hennis and Kappa. Poe and Finn had checked in on things a while back. At one point, Rose had stopped by to chat. But they had all gotten bored and left.

Everyone on the small base would know when the jury was done deliberating. The four of them seemed to be the only ones compelled to wait near the courtroom.

“I’d think you’re be hoping for a long deliberation,” Kappa said.

Hennis shrugged. “As long as they didn’t all make up their mind right away, I’m hopeful, but I’ve never been sure that long deliberations are always good for the defense. For all, I know their all on my side, and there’s one lone hold out arguing about throwing the book at him.”

“You really think your call to a higher morality is going to outweigh how much a bunch of Resistance soldiers hate Kylo Ren?” Kappa asked.

“I’m not counting on the jury’s higher ideals,” Hennis explained. “I’m counting in their self-interest. Like you said, they’re Resistance fighters, not part of the New Republic fleet. They here, because they didn’t trust the Senate to protect the Republic against the First Order. I’m guessing they don’t trust a bunch of politicians to have their back when push comes to shove. Uh, no offense, Senator,” Hennis acknowledge Leia.

She smiled. “Hardly the first time I’ve heard that people don’t trust politicians.”

Everyone was silent again for a while, but something was bothering Rey.

“You don’t really think it could take days you do?”

That seemed impossible to bear. Days of waiting, days of limbo. Maybe she should have been looking at it as an opportunity. An opportunity to plan what came next. The closer they’d gotten to the end of the trial, the more Rey had realized how much she’d meant it when she’d told Kylo she wouldn’t let them execute him.

Whatever he deserved, it wasn’t that.

She knew she should have been planning some sort of escape, but somehow never managed to.

“Maybe,” Kappa responded. “It’s not unheard of, and there is a long list of charges. Maker knows how complicated sentencing could get.”

“Sentencing?” Rey asked.

“Once they decide what crime’s he’s guilty of,” Leia explained, “His punishment for each charge has to be decided.”

“Why,” Rey frowned. “They can only execute him once. Does the rest really matter?”

“You don’t have to worry about that,” Kappa said. “Since the charges on Silas III were thrown out, the only other capital charges are for the destruction of the Hosnian System. . . And well, even if the jury does find him guilty of that, I wouldn’t feel right pursuing the death penalty. Whatever his involvement was, it wasn’t direct enough to warrant that.”

“And of course there are the appeals,” Hennis said with a smile even as Kappa rolled her eyes. “The Judge’s outburst alone is enough to start an appeals process, not to mention all the questions about Jedi law.”

“Appeals?” Rey asked, a feeling of dread growing inside of her.

If they were going to execute him, she could handle that. She would figure out how to handle it. But if they couldn’t decide on that. If this was going to just keep going. . . 

“There’s another process,” Hennis explained. “To make sure the trial really was fair. Even if we lose today, there’s still a chance a few months from now that the conviction will be overturned, and he’ll be let go.

“A few months?” Rey asked. Suddenly she was feeling very, very sick. “I... Excuse me.”

Maybe it was the baby. The medical droid had warned her that the pregnancy might make her nauseous or sick. It hadn’t happened yet, but Rey found herself running for the nearest fresher. 

She couldn’t do this. She couldn’t just wait and wait and wait. And there was the baby. Months from now, would she be too pregnant to save Kylo from execution if he needed it? Except she wouldn’t be pregnant then, because she wasn’t going to keep the baby? Was she?

Luckily she made it to the fresher in time. Whether it was the pregnancy or the stress, it didn’t matter. Rey had lost her breakfast. 

And none of that even took into account the tiny possibility that they let him go. What did that even mean? What would that look like? She didn’t think he was going to simply walk away from her, especially now that she was pregnant. But what then?

Rey was never going to join the First Order, and she didn’t think he would leave it. So where could they go, what could they do?

“Rey?” it was Leia’s voice from outside the fresher door. “Are you all right?”

“I... Yes, I... I just need a moment.”

She rinsed her mouth out and did her best to look normal. But as soon as she opened the door and saw Leia standing there, something broke inside Rey. The next thing she knew, she was crying incoherently in Leia’s arms. 

Leia put her arms around Rey and stroked her hair. “I know,” Leia said soothingly, “I know.”

* * *

**Garnik V 53 days after the crash**

It was Rey who saw the ship. Kylo was off in the jungle, gathering some of the herbs he liked to flavor their food with. 

She didn’t recognize the ship itself, but it wasn’t First Order; it was too run down for that. 

“Hey,” she shouted in joy, trying to get the ship's attention. Then feeling foolish, she reached out, calling her lightsaber to her.

She ignited it, and waved it above her head, realizing the that purple blade would be far more likely to attract the ship’s attention.

And then the ship opened fire. 

It took her a moment to understand what had happened. The blasts flew over her head, nowhere close to harming her. That confused her instincts since she didn’t need to dodge out of the way.

She looked over her shoulder as the ship swung around for another run, and her heart sank as she realized what had happened.

Extinguishing her lightsaber, she ran as fast as she could to the jungle’s edge. Kylo must have heard her yelling and had come to see what it was. Focused on her, he hadn’t noticed the ship.

Luckily his instincts must have kicked in at the last moment, and he’d rolled mostly out of the way because had he taken one of the ship's blasters straight on, he’d be dead. Instead, he was unconscious, blood flowing from the side of his head, where some of the debris from the blast had struck him.

As soon as she was sure he wasn’t dead, she ignited her lightsaber once again, wondering if it was strong enough to deflect a blast from the ship.

She didn’t have to find out. Instead, it landed, and Poe and Finn flooded out blasters in hand.

“Rey!” Finn yelled excitedly. “I knew we’d find you.”

* * *

The jury didn’t come back with a decision on the first day. But discovering that nothing was likely to be over anytime soon, was just what Rey needed to actually make a plan.

She had ended up talking to Poe to see if he’d known about the appeals, and what would happen then. It turned out he had been preparing for that. 

He was just as impatient about the whole thing as she was, although perhaps for different reasons. He wanted to get back to fighting the First Order. Arrangements had been made to ship Kylo Ren off to a proper prison after the trial, where he could be held until all the appeals were done.

And he was somewhat delighted when Rey offered to be part of Kylo’s escort to the new prison.

“I didn’t want to ask,” he said. “I hate to think of you as just a glorified prison guard, but so many things could go wrong transporting him.”

Rey agreed. A lot of things could go wrong. Like the Jedi, who was supposed to be guarding him, deciding to help him escape instead.

That was actually the easy part. The hard part was what came next. The best Rey had come up with so far was taking Kylo back to Takodona. It gave Rey a kind of cover, she could pretend that she’d done it because she felt that he deserved to be tried on the planets where he’d committed his crimes. 

But really, she just wanted Maz’s advice. 

And then there was the little voice of doubt. That voice that reminded Rey that she was about to betray her friends and the Resistance. After all, maybe the system would work? Maybe the appeals would happen, and he would be released.? Maybe she just needed to be patient?

But Rey had hit the end of her patience. She couldn’t spend any more months in this limbo waiting for other people to decide what happened next. 

It took two days, but finally, the jury came back with a verdict.

For once, the courtroom was full. Witnesses like Poe and Finn, who hadn’t been allowed to watch the main proceedings were now allowed back in. Even Rose, who hadn’t directly be involved, was there.

“I understand that the Jury has reached a verdict?” the Judge asked. 

“Yes, your honor,” one of the jurors stood up and said.

“On the count of kidnapping Commander Poe Dameron, we find the defendant not guilty.

There was a small gasp. Most people had expected him to be found guilty on all counts.

“On the count of the torture of Commander Poe Dameron, we find the defendant guilty.

Rey frowned in confusion.

“On the count of destruction of property and the assault on Takodona, we found the defendant not guilty.

“On both counts of kidnapping Rey Starfallen, we find the defendant not guilty.

“On the count of torture of Rey Starfallen, we find the defendant guilty.

“On the count of the murder of Han Solo, we find the defendant not guilty.”

“On the count of the destruction of the Hosnian system, we find the defendant not guilty.”

And on its went. “What’s happening?” Rey finally whispered to Leia in confusion as more and more counts came back not guilty.

“Who can say,” Leia whispered back. “But my guess…Hennis did a good job, but they weren’t willing to let him get away with everything. I guess torture is where they decided to draw the line.”

They weren’t the only ones whispering, a dull hum slowly rose throughout the court, and the Judge was forced to slam down his gavel so the juror could continue reading out the charges.

Finally, it was done. All Kylo Ren had been found guilty of was torturing her and Poe.

The Judge silenced the court again.

“And this is your final verdict?” he asked the jury.

They nodded slowly.

“I see,” the Judge said slowly. 

His voice was almost too calm, Rey thought. She knew the pain and anger he felt, and she had expected him to be raging. But instead, there was a cold determination in him that frightened her.

“I wish I could say this was the first time I have seen a jury rule incorrectly. It is the nature of the system that sometimes we get it wrong. But I have to respect the verdict you have come to. That being said-”

Suddenly the air raid alarms went off in the courtroom and throughout the base. The Judge and the attorneys looked around in confusion, but the Resistance members were already on their feet. 

Poe was shouting for everyone to get to their stations, and people were moving quickly and mostly orderly out of the courtroom.

Rey decided quickly that what she needed to do was get Leia to the command center. It was the most heavily fortified part of the underground base. But they were near the center of the room, and it made no sense to try and force their way to the front. 

She placed her hand on Leia’s shoulder to guide her, but the General was already moving. This was hardly her first unexpected attack.

Then there was a loud explosion, and the room shook. Dust filled the air. Rey looked up and saw that the ceiling had cracked in the center, and dirt from above was slowly dripping in.

A wave of dark emotions caught Rey’s attention, and her eyes darted to Kylo, who was being escorted out the other way by his guards, but it wasn’t him. 

The last thing Rey saw as the ceiling caved in was the Judge raise a blaster and aim it Kylo.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So if you noticed, this is now a part of a series. You can find the first chapter of [Broken Throne](https://archiveofourown.org/works/21618343/chapters/51549430) here.
> 
> Thank you all so much for reading and I hope you enjoy the next part. I could only keep the larger Star Wars universe at bay for so long ;)

**Author's Note:**

> This was not the Reylo story I meant to write. I was trying to figure out the ending for another story idea and it felt like there were only two ways a Reylo story could end: Rey joins the First Order in some way, or they run off together and let the Galaxy take care of itself. It seemed like Kylo Ren couldn't go back to the Resistance because he would be tried and executed or spend in life in prison. 
> 
> That didn't really sit right with me. At first, it was because that would mean there was no real way for the war to end. If the First Order leaders are just going to be tried and executed why would they ever talk peace or surrender? They have no choice but to fight to the death. But then I realized I was making a lot of assumptions based on our world which has things like the United Nations and the Geneva Conventions. And if he was a POW he could be held but not tried (at least until the war was over).
> 
> But that's our world, not the Star Wars Galaxy.
> 
> So I started getting really fascinated by what a trial might mean, and how I think it might be a really bad idea, and this fic was born. And as I was getting my thoughts down a lot of wonderful Reylo moments I didn't expect began to come out of it.
> 
> Also, I wanted to try and share it before TROS comes out (in part because a latter part of the story is inspired by the first TROS trailer and I'm sure has nothing to do with what happens in the movie).
> 
> So here is my story on why putting Kylo Ren on trial is a terrible idea.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Running Into You](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20805206) by [ClockworkCrow (icemink)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/icemink/pseuds/ClockworkCrow)


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